and then went on to disparage Rey for being a strong female character.

I think the most obtuse statement I heard at celebration between two white males was “I’m not a misogynist, I like strong female protagonists, I play as women in videos games, but…” and then went on to disparage Rey for being a strong female character. The other one in a similar class was “I’m all for women being in…

Hey just a heads up, what this comment section DOESN’T need - your commentary about how you have no problem with Kelly Marie Tran/Moses Ingram/John Boyega/etc. you just don’t like the characters they play or how they were written.

Nope. Listen, I’ve loved Diablo from day 1, played Hellfire, used to wake up before school to grind for runes in D2, and enjoyed D3 post auction house, but there is no way in hell I’m downloading Immortal. Yeah, I could play for free, but number of downloads is still a metric Blizzard uses; number of “potential…

It has a dog.

The author concludes with a lukewarm it’s complicated and a metaphorical shrug emoji while saying that they might be wrong.  I am agreeing that they are wrong.

The title is actively encouraging people to take the first hit for free and risk getting sucked in though. Like you see the problem but you’re still flippant about steering people into harm’s way. I understand where you’re coming from—I played the game and didn’t spend anything either. And if I wrote about games…

I absolutely am in favor of banning gambling, since it’s a behavior which preys on the average person’s poor understanding of statistics (as well as certain exploitable aspects of human psychology) and it has no positive impact of which I’m aware.

This is a terrible take.

“Sure, they’re giving out <addictive substance> for free, but we can just stop once they start asking for money. We probably won’t be addicted by that point...”

Many people can do what the article describes, play the fun free parts of the game and then walk once they start asking for money. A smaller percentage will…

Something I’ve noticed a lot of lately is people demanding “Show, Don’t Tell”, then the moment something (especially Star Wars) tries to convey anything visually, all I hear is “Why did that character do that!?”, or “Why did they do that weird thing with the editing?!?”.

Imma agree with you here, and I haven’t even seen a moment of Clone Wars. I saw that character, and I thought, “Oh, wow, that’s probably a character that means something to people. It’s showing how terrible the murder of all those Jedis has been. I get it. This is a moment of pathos.”

Even though it’s the one Obi-Wan himself was staring at? Fair enough I guess.

When did sneering cynicism become the default mode with which everyone else consumes all forms of media?

I guess the ostensibly poor, $197 million worldwide box-office was considered good enough, taking into account the pandemic presumably limited attendance; 2021 feels so long ago. No idea what the budget was for Afterlife, but it seemed to have a big marketing campaign with it (least it had here)

so if everyone wears a mask it will...

It does if the mask prevents the saliva and other fluids containing the virus from getting to your nose and mouth. I read a study saying wearing a mask is about 80% effective at preventing YOU from contracting the virus. It’s not 100%, but if you were told one restaurant was 80% lower chance of you getting food…

Agreed. It’s just ugly Sonic.

Looks like Sonic to me

Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock board a train full of Japanese assassins in the latest trailer for David Leitch’s Bullet Train.