Matt Damon Says Netflix Wants Movies to Restate the ‘Plot Three or Four Times in the Dialogue’ Because Viewers are on ‘Their Phones While They’re Watching’
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I think re-explaining things that happened in previous seasons is a different issue. They're worried that you don't remember what happened because it has been so long.
And that's fair. I know I watched Season 2 (and it definitely had my full attention, because I'm incapable of doing two things at once), but the only thing I can actually remember about it is the episode where El went to Chicago and met some shadowrunners. And something about tunnels. Everything else is a blur.
The last season being a big mess aside, it was 100% guilty of re-explaining the plot, not just the recaps. Together with those unnecessary "LET ME EXPLAIN" scenes, like Robin using vinyls to explain a very basic concept. They really treated us like idiots.
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I think I read a different article about this months ago!
For some reason I’m kind of surprised to hear about it again because not a lot of people seem to talk about it.
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Oh fucking please.. that has nothing to do with it.
lol yea, toootally nothing to do with it. That's why nobody ever talks about great movies, and movies toooootally aren't getting longer nad longer... yep, totally not a quality to attention thing.
Not like there are legendary movies that are several hours long that people still watch... Yep, quality has nothing to do with how long people stay engaged with movies!
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I think re-explaining things that happened in previous seasons is a different issue. They're worried that you don't remember what happened because it has been so long.
And that's fair. I know I watched Season 2 (and it definitely had my full attention, because I'm incapable of doing two things at once), but the only thing I can actually remember about it is the episode where El went to Chicago and met some shadowrunners. And something about tunnels. Everything else is a blur.
I agree with what you're saying (aside from comparing that really awful episode to Shadowrun), but that's not what went on in Stranger Things. It was just....
From the very first episode, I asked if they had changed writers because the dialogue was so different, so bad, and so predictable--all of which only grew worse with each passing episode. And when each character had their turn to explain who they are and how they feel, it fit the same exact pattern every time. It was just really bad writing.
All that said, I don't think the last season was terrible. I expected it to be a lot worse than it was. The actual plot and ending of the story, I thought were perfectly mediocre and fine. It was ruined by the dialogue.
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Talk about the wrong response!
If they want people to not look away or do something else while the movie is playing you gotta keep it interesting.
Ya know, like perhaps making movies that aren't just rehashes of the same old stories.
Make movies and shows that keep people on their toes!
Making a crime drama? Throw in some traveler from the future or a demon or both! Give the judge two heads because of a "merging accident" or something!
Putting together a horror movie? Throw in some romance among the monsters! Have them feed each other eyeballs or something!
Making an anime? Try something totally radical! Like a male protagonist with non-dark hair that has a personality, or make a couple—in love—who get stuck somewhere together, alone have actual sex (like normal teens would) or something!
Making a K-drama? Add a black guy and make him one of the main characters... Haha, just kidding! That would be too radical! That'd be just as extreme as making an anime that covers the time period a few years after "the hero" formed his harem!
Interesting takes skill. Skill takes money. Capitalists don't care about skill or art. They are only interested in money.
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Make movies that are engaging enough to keep people from checking their feeds while they wait for something to happen.
That’s the problem they don’t want to discuss. Writing has gotten seriously shitty.
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If someone starts a movie and immediately pulls their phone out or starts cleaning, that’s on them.
And movies absolutely should not be made to cater to addiction. Nothing should, except for something explicitly designed to help people recover from addiction.
When movies have a good idea and are given the proper attention to make them well, regular people won’t be checking the time or reading blogs when they become bored. The problem is that studios say that, good idea or not, proper attention to the craft or not, we’re making this many movies this year. We’re lucky if a few of those movies are something future generations would consider good.
Matt Damon is suggesting that movies be made even worse than they already are.
Matt Damon is suggesting
It definitely reads more as "Netflix execs suggest and Matt Damon complains about"
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Why? What the fuck do they care as long as people watch it?
Make good stuff, and people will come.
Seriously. Plus maybe I wouldn't have my phone out if they didn't start plopping ads into shows.
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I wouldn't have my phone out to begin with Netflix if you didn't start adding ads.
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I find shows and movies that show something happen clearly and then restate it in the dialogue immediately quite annoying. Very common in anime.
Some YouTube channels do this and I started to hide them in the recommendations because it pisses me off so much.
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That was definitely part of it, but I think they also wrote themselves into a corner in previous seasons by not properly laying the groundwork for any of the supernatural stuff. In Season 5, they had to constantly infodump the viewers in those "plan" scenes to keep up.
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Wait, you're telling me that restating dialog makes you annoyed, especially because it happens so frequently in anime?
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Make content that makes people put their phones down.
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Wait, you're telling me that restating dialog makes you annoyed, especially because it happens so frequently in anime?
Metal Gear????
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To be fair, that can be necessary to make the action understandable, especially when you're adapting a game that you don't expect the viewers to be experts in. (Which is always because these shows are usually supposed to be advertisements.
Imagine an MtG-themed show where battles looked like this:
Player A: "Okay, your turn."
Player B: "Untap, draw... In my precombat main I play Isochron Scepter with Pongify."
Player A: "Fold."
Spectator: "Yeah, that was obviously unwinnable."
...without even bothering to explain the cards, much less why player A's game couldn't stand up to a questionable use of an Isochron Scepter.
(Of course a particularly egregious case was Yu-Gi-Oh, which needed these explanations because the card game as shown on the show made no sense.)
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lol yea, toootally nothing to do with it. That's why nobody ever talks about great movies, and movies toooootally aren't getting longer nad longer... yep, totally not a quality to attention thing.
Not like there are legendary movies that are several hours long that people still watch... Yep, quality has nothing to do with how long people stay engaged with movies!
Do the people who have their phones out in films nowadays watch those old movies without looking at their phones, hmm?
Your snark makes you sound like an arsehole.
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Why? What the fuck do they care as long as people watch it?
Make good stuff, and people will come.
People will leave if they don't like what they see. People won't like what they don't understand. People won't understand what isn't either simple or redundantly written because they don't pay attention.
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Seems helpful. I’m probably watching Netflix, driving a ride share right this very moment AND cooking my family a nutritious dinner all at this very moment
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lol yea, toootally nothing to do with it. That's why nobody ever talks about great movies, and movies toooootally aren't getting longer nad longer... yep, totally not a quality to attention thing.
Not like there are legendary movies that are several hours long that people still watch... Yep, quality has nothing to do with how long people stay engaged with movies!
Bud.. people are on thier phones constantly.. there nothing that will stop that..
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As long as they don't mess with the tradition of saying the name of the show/movie in the show/movie in the most corny manner possible.
