Day 215 - Year 2 - Television and Stuff

It stormed briefly last night, nothing serious, but the temperatures dropped into the fifties and sixties. So the a/c is blessedly off again.

And I'm less congested than previously.

Been watching television mostly today, although I did take a walk around 3Pm to pick up more groceries from the health food store, and on the way back flowers. (I went to Frontiere, which is closer, as opposed to Flatbush, which is further away and more crowded).

Television

* Squid Game - went back to watch a few more episodes, I'm about three episodes into it now. It's available on Netflix in the US (not sure about elsewhere) and the biggest hit on Netflix in its history. (I'm not sure I'd brag about this? It's also among the most violent. Reminds me a little of other similar series within this category - Battle Royal - the Japanese Film and of course, the Hunger Games. Also, Stephen King's "The Running Man". All of which are satires on reality show contests with deadly consequences. Of three - the Japanese film was by far the most brutal. It's also a very popular trope in Magna and anime, I've certainly seen it pop up a lot. And after The Hunger Games - in young adult dystopian fiction - see Maze Runner series. Heck Marvel Comics has been making fun of this particular trope for the last forty some years. Note - all of these are satires of reality shows - such as Survivor, Fear (where contestants face their worse fears) and Naked - a reality series where folks are left naked somewhere to survive. Actually you know we've gone to far when the satires start writing themselves. ) This one reminds me the most of various social psychology experiments I studied about fifteen years ago in an organizational psychology course. (I've long since come to the conclusion that you've got to be a little bit on the sadistic/sociopathic side to be an organizational psychologist or a reality a television show producer for that matter.)

The set-up is some sadist decides to track down and persuade a bunch of down-on-their-luck inhabitants of Korea to enter into a deadly contest of sorts. There's a main point of view character or "gate-way" character who brings in other characters via their initial interactions with him, and then we follow their points of view and stories, and so on. The gate-way isn't that interesting in of himself, but the others are.
( spoilers )

A few caveats? This series works better in the original Korean with subtitles. The English dubbing is atrocious, it doesn't even match the subtitles let alone the speakers. Among the worst that I've seen. It's kind of hard to dub the Korean series well, for some reason. Although I found the English dubbing for Lupin horrible too - and switched to the original French.

Also, the violence isn't quite as bad as it appears in the first episode. (Weirdly it gets slightly better as we move forward?). It's mainly people being shot in the head after the first episode. And the second isn't that violent at all. I'd call it more cartoon violence?( Read more... )

It's a South Korean Satire. So, I'm not certain I'd say its necessarily a satire on just capitalism, it seems to be against communism too. Because what lies to the North of South Korean...blasted North Korea. Various characters are in fact defectors of North Korea, and some served in the South Korean military. There's also an assumption that the North Koreans never played children's games - so those defectors are at a loss. I think it is more of a satire on our society at large and how sadistic it is. It feels more like a soci-political/psychological satire than a socio-economic one at the moment. I mean, it does ask the question is the audience complicit in watching the violence?

I don't know if I'll stick with it or not. I've seen a lot of similar versions of this trope. So, I kind of already know where its going and from the descriptions of the future episodes, I doubt it will surprise me. That said, I did find at least four characters to care about. But alas, none are the gate-way character, which isn't that surprising - I rarely like gate-way characters, they tend to be ciphers with not much to them.

And it's a kind of depressing? Satire tends to be. And as you all know, depressing isn't what I need right now.

* Great British Baking Show (I know it's called Bake Off in Britain, but that's an infringement of Pillsbury's copyright on "Bake Off" in the US, so they had to rename it for the US audience. Personally, I think "Bake Off" is a bit too common a term to fit the trademark originality test, but what do I know?)

I liked the first five-six seasons. Everything past that has been...kind of off for me. ( Read more... )

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Family

Mother called me to talk to father today.

Mother: Do you want me to call your son?
Father: Don't we have other children?
Mother: You're father suggested we call you today. When I asked if he wanted to call your brother, he asked if we had other kids available?
ME: Nice to know I've not been forgotten.
Mother: I'm putting you on speaker.
Me: Did you remember you had another kid?
Father: Yes, just as I have more than one sibling.
Me: Hate to break it to you but you have multiple siblings. But nice that you remembered your first born.
Father: 1980 has been a tough year.
Me: Well it wasn't as bad as 2020. I could handle 1980.
Father: as opposed to 1986, that's not bad.
Mother: You granduated high school in 1985.
Me: And we're in 1986 now, I guess?
Mother: No, your father's in 1886.
ME: You've discovered time travel? Although I really don't want to be in 1886. You can go there by yourself.

I kind of lost track of the conversation after that. Mother was off today anyhow. She's been worrying about her hip again. It hurts. She's afraid she set herself back a bit, when she leaned down to fix her armchair. And maybe it hurts more these past two weeks than it did the previous ones. But she's not certain. And she's scared. And I don't know what to tell her or what to do. Except raise fist at universe.

It's been one of those Sundays. I'm frustrated again, and resentful. Church service was annoying.
( Read more... )

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