My favorite bit of feedback I ever got in those teaching evaluations was “sometimes she wants us to know stuff, but I wish she’d just tell us the answer”. I kept that one :)

I think the biggest example of someone who clearly didn’t understand what was good about their own work is George Lucas, although there’s plenty of other examples.  Heroes springs to mind - season 2 made it abundantly clear that they had no idea what people had liked about S1.  

And, one of those approaches isn’t inherently better or worse than the other - I really enjoyed both of those Charlie’s Angels movies.  I’m always interested to see what directions people can go with the same base premises/starting material.  

For Hackers, they consulted with people who were pretty big in the scene at the time, but were very clear that all they wanted from the consultants was the culture stuff, war stories, etc.  There’s actually a few scenes in it that are borrowed from stories the consultants provided.  

Obviously their McGuffin is totally made up, but other than that most of it is very accurate for the time - there’s a math word that’s misused in the lecture they attend that really stands out because most of the rest is so well done. (They say “of Gaussian proportions”, which is a nonsensical way to use that word)

Given the choice of those two, Neo hands-down (John Wick’s whole thing is that everyone he loves is dead), but obviously the right choice, given all roles to choose from, is to be Ted Theodore Logan.

Is that a judgement on the “141 days” thing?  Lots of recovery processes involve marking weeks, then months, since a drink or relapse - that isn’t in any way unusual.  

He made his wife/marriage and his disinterest in having kids part of his set, so people therefore feel like he:

Excuse me? In what way, exactly? He wasn’t just an artist, this was something he organized, and he regularly encouraged crowds to behave dangerously and this tragedy is a totally foreseeable result of the recklessness and negligence of everyone who put this event together, himself included. Multiple children are dead,…

What old show or movie do you wish were available to stream somewhere, but isn’t?

What was the first concert you ever went to?  

How did you gain the confidence to commit to an entertainment industry career?

What’s your go-to sick day/comfort movie?  

Ok, but why is mensch in quotes?  It makes it seem like the opposite is meant, or something

I know someone who was one of those musical prodigies touring with Dr Suzuki as a kid - their mom started training them how to hold a violin when they were 2. Totally nuts. And, that person not only doesn’t even own a violin at this point, they also don’t speak to their mother. There’s lots of parents out there who…

It doesn’t make a ton of sense to me, given that the biggest business reason to make it is the built in fanbase, but most of the fanbase is already totally soured on the idea of a live action adaptation.

You’re right, there is more nuance there than many acknowledge - I was being a bit lazy in using Xander as my example, because I was trying to be brief. The longer version is that it’s just lots of little things that didn’t jump out to me originally but that now cause cringe moments. I still love the show - the…

Also: to the troll who I’m not going to help get un-greyed, yes, there absolutely are LGBTQ+ kids - not everyone figures stuff like that out when they’re young, but some do, and to pretend otherwise is a hateful erasure of people who already often feel unseen or like their truth is invalidated by the culture at…

The sorting hat thing is supposedly more about personality, not genetics, but as an adult I also really dislike the idea of binning people like that, particularly because, with the way it’s presented, they’re explicitly telling some kids that they’re bad, and they’re giving other kids the idea that they’re inherently…

Sure, but the hardcore fandom is very online - but, the kids who’re being newly introduced to HP, less so.