Ghostbusters, Frozen, and the strange entitlement of fan culture.
May 26, 2016 7:09 AM   Subscribe

 
1. Just the picture of the Hi-C Ecto-cooler puts that taste right back in my mouth as if it were 30 years ago.

2. The Ghostbusters thing, for me, I'm not going to go see it, because I don't see re-makes, unless the original is so irrelevant to me that the new one would replace the original. [Example, for me, Father of the Bride].

3. I don't have any issue with fan entitlement, to be honest. The creators are free to ignore it.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:16 AM on May 26, 2016


The point is that the creators (at least in this case) are made not free to ignore it by a concerted campaign or campaign(s), orchestrated over the internet, to derail the remake, on sexist/misogynist or other grounds.
posted by blucevalo at 7:22 AM on May 26, 2016 [17 favorites]


Ghostbusters is one of my 14 year old daughter's favorite movies. She's so excited for the remake, which she doesn't see as a remake so much as another sequel. Haters gonna hate, and meanwhile, I'll be hanging out having popcorn with my kid. I'll be having the better time.
posted by Ruki at 7:23 AM on May 26, 2016 [15 favorites]


I can't engage with any fan culture any more... games, movies, TV, SF/F, whatever. It's all just a thin veneer of interest in the subject and then an endless ocean of incredibly toxic negativity, drama, and bullshit.

It has really taught me, though, that being "into" something is actually kind of terrible most of the time and maybe dilettantes have the right idea after all.
posted by selfnoise at 7:24 AM on May 26, 2016 [87 favorites]


Creators doing better work before they start listening to their fans certainly isn't a new phenomenon. It's impacted almost every author, for example, I think. But yes, the internet's instant-gratification and faux-empowerment culture probably makes it even harder to resist.

As for Ghostbusters... hmm. I think I'd have flinched at the trailer no matter what sort of human-type beings and/or animatronic characters of any sex or gender were used in a remake, because my gut says that if a film is going to be good, it probably doesn't need to lean on the old branding and name-recognition. It just seems lazy. Tell a new story, already.

I mean, there aren't zero of them, but it takes an awfully, awfully good remake to get me interested.
posted by rokusan at 7:24 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


While I agree that there are some weird things about fan culture---adopting the fact that you like movies that are wildly popular as some form of outsider, "geeky" cred, showing your devotion through enormous collections of DVDs and memorabilia like Rolfe does, and, yes, entitlement---this still seems like a false equivalency. Even aside from the obvious political differences, one group of people is saying they refuse to see a movie based on what it is. The other is saying they'd like to see an upcoming movie do something, and no one knows if that will happen or not. It's overstating the case to say it's "chilling" to see fans wish for a queer character. No one's forcing Disney to do anything.
posted by zeusianfog at 7:25 AM on May 26, 2016 [12 favorites]


One of the things I really loved about Mad Max: Fury Road was that it wasn't an adaptation. So there were few complaints about the movie not being this or that, it was just enjoyed for what it was, instead of being compared, perhaps endlessly, to something it can never be. It feels like we're in a glut of adaptations and hearing the same basic argument over and over, i.e., "The book was better".

As to the new Ghostbusters, let's be honest, it doesn't look to be that funny, based on the latest trailers. But at this point it doesn't matter, it'll be a film headlined by 4 women in non-traditional roles (as defined by society) and probably successful based on that alone. Which is fine, things like that need to happen. But the question of it being good is almost moot at this point.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:26 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


The "I hate this because it's wrecking my childhood" argument is such transparent bullshit.

Hollywood loves remaking/rebooting/sequelizing old hits. Most of those remakes/reboots/sequels are quite bad. It's annoying and unnecessary and I used to express my rage over it but now I'm just numb to it, like most reasonable nerds are.

What's getting these guys out of the woodwork to bitch about Ladybusters isn't that it's a reboot -- it's because it's being rebooted to feature -gasp- women. If that weren't the case, then folks like James Rolfe would have been just as passionate in coming out against TMNT (2014), Godzilla (2014 and 1998), Pete's fucking Dragon (2016), or The Magnificent Seven (2016).

I'm sad that Ladybusters looks so very bad (I really wanted to love it) -- but if it sucks, it's obviously not because of the women, it's because shitty unnecessary remakes suck.
posted by sparklemotion at 7:28 AM on May 26, 2016 [39 favorites]


The only reason I intend to see Ghostbusters is because the MRAs are mad about it. I saw Fury Road for much the same reason, and although I don't expect a similar payoff, I'm satisfied with my decision.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:28 AM on May 26, 2016 [30 favorites]




Hot on the heels of the JustTwoThings thread, this remind me of how easy it is for saturation to ruin the savor of nostalgia.

Eventually the market that produces creative goods will exhaust the appetite for this backward looking set of films(etc). What then?

Will it suddenly become more profitable again to create new ideas? Or will it just accelerate mashup so that it tries to fit more of the generation's identity into wierder combinations?
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 7:31 AM on May 26, 2016


[Example, for me, Father of the Bride].

Remake a 41 year old movie = that's just fine.
Remake a 32 year old movie = sacrilegious.

Or, perhaps, people hate remakes of movies they saw in their youth, and don't mind remakes of movies made before they were young.
posted by GhostintheMachine at 7:31 AM on May 26, 2016 [17 favorites]


I still really liked this tweet about the new Ghostbusters movie I saw a while back.

I mean, I guess? Not every movie has to be made with people of the other gender. Female heroes can have other stories, too.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:31 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


While I agree that there are some weird things about fan culture...

Don't forget adopting a corporate brand as a personal marker of identity.
posted by klanawa at 7:32 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


Remake a 41 year old movie = that's just fine.
Remake a 32 year old movie = sacrilegious.

Or, perhaps, people hate remakes of movies they saw in their youth, and don't mind remakes of movies made before they were young.


It's the latter. The original Father of the Bride was made thirty years before I was born. I saw Ghostbusters when I was four.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:33 AM on May 26, 2016 [4 favorites]


The only reason I intend to see Ghostbusters is because the MRAs are mad about it. I saw Fury Road for much the same reason, and although I don't expect a similar payoff, I'm satisfied with my decision.

I saw Fury Road for the same reason, and I loved it, but I'm kind of put off about being expected to play this game with Ghostbusters. I'll probably enjoy it when I get around to seeing it, but I LOATHE the idea that I am making some sort of feminist statement by seeing it or have some obligation to enjoy it. I don't want YOU ARE POLITICALLY AND MORALLY OBLIGATED TO CONSUME THIS to be the new default marketing strategy, especially for light summer comedies. Not everything has to be turned into some with-us-or-against-us declaration.
posted by almostmanda at 7:44 AM on May 26, 2016 [23 favorites]


I mean, I guess? Not every movie has to be made with people of the other gender. Female heroes can have other stories, too.

And little boys can also see kickass women as heroes, just as most women today grew up with mostly kickass dudes as their heroes.

Or, perhaps, people hate remakes of movies they saw in their youth, and don't mind remakes of movies made before they were young.

I think that this hits the nail on the head. It's ok to grate at the fact that they are remaking all of your faves from when you were a kid because 1.) nostalgia, and 2.) kids these days, get off my lawn, etc, etc. We all want to rage against the dying of light and pretend that we are still the people that these movies are getting made for, even though we are the olds.

But, the kids these days exist. And the studios want to produce content for them, and annoying as it may be for us, it's easier for the studio to remake old hits than to come up with new stuff. So we have to accept that Ghostbusters got remade. Just like The Neverending Story and The Goonies probably will soon.

So if we accept that Ghostbusters is getting remade -- why not gender-swap it? At least that's something unique. I mean, they could have just gone for 2 male and 2 female busters, or they could have gone all male and more diverse, or any other sorts of changes.
posted by sparklemotion at 7:45 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


I wrote a similar piece on Medium a while back. I'll TL;DR it.

Geek Culture used to be about love. There was always drama, of course, but geekdom and fandom involved making art and making connections. That's become secondary to being a "Critic", which is really just a reviewer. Geek Criticism rarely makes actual criticism, it's almost always about how bad the special effects are, how many plot holes are in the movie, or how they made some arbitrary change from the source material in whatever adaptation. People who do real criticism of geek culture are attacked. Anita Sarkeesian gets rape and death threats for critiquing Geek Cultural artifacts like art. I doubt anyone's threatened James Rolfe for not wanting to see the new Ghostbusters.

There's this incredible dichotomy inherent to Geek Culture. We (by which I mean geeks, of which I consider myself one) have both a Superiority Complex and an Inferiority Complex. No matter how successful and popular our niche interests become, we feel the need to draw increasingly more arbitrary lines in the sand to identify the Real Fans from the Fakers. It's how Avengers: Age of Ultron can make $1.5 billion dollars at the box office, while the "Everything Wrong With..." video for it has 6 million views. This shit is fucked up.
posted by SansPoint at 7:45 AM on May 26, 2016 [21 favorites]


I don't think fan culture was ever separate from a sense of ownership of the material.
posted by Ferreous at 7:47 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


Haters gonna hate, and meanwhile, I'll be hanging out having popcorn with my kid. I'll be having the better time.

It's a tough call, whether to go and watch this version of Ghostbusters 3 with popcorn and kids and stuff, or to sit all night in a dark room when it's released, face contorted in rage, composing an angry rant about how much I hate the very idea of anyone creating or watching this horrid attempt at a Ghostbusters sequel. If only there were some other alternative.
posted by sfenders at 7:47 AM on May 26, 2016 [9 favorites]


sparklemotion: Agreed. I'm no fan of remakes, and I would infinitely prefer a world where we got new properties with female leads than remakes and reboots over and over again. That said, if we have to have reboots, doing something like an all-female lead cast is better than just rehashing it the same old way.

And, truth is, I'm cautiously optimistic about the new Ghostbusters.
posted by SansPoint at 7:47 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


So if we accept that Ghostbusters is getting remade -- why not gender-swap it?

Because if it's for the kids of today, why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:48 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


Brandon Blatcher I'd be okay with that too.
posted by SansPoint at 7:51 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Ghostbusters the movie was already a remake of a (terrible) live action children's show. If the franchise can survive the guy in a gorilla suit it can survive some women and a lazy racial caricature.
posted by idiopath at 7:55 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


Max Landis talks quite a bit about the fact that most big movies are now made based simply on intellectual property. Which is pretty much about trying to give fans what they want to see.

I can't really be too mad about fan service seeing that this season of GoT is all about that.
posted by P.o.B. at 7:55 AM on May 26, 2016


idiopath: Yes and no... it wasn't so much a remake of the (terrible) live action children's show as an original story with the same premise. They even prepared for the possibility that they couldn't get the title by recording a bunch of alternate takes of the commercial in the film with names like "Ghost Smashers," etc. Sadly, the video in that article's been DMCA'd.
posted by SansPoint at 7:58 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


If we’re really taking votes on how Frozen 2 goes, I’d be happy to cast my vote for “leave Frozen alone and don’t make a sequel.”

Sort of a million times this, about all sorts of movies.


I often wondered why Beetlejuice didn't get a sequel, wikipedia says it almost happened:
The story followed the Deetz family moving to Hawaii, where Charles is developing a resort. They soon discover that his company is building on the burial ground of an ancient Hawaiian Kahuna. The spirit comes back from the afterlife to cause trouble, and Betelgeuse becomes a hero by winning a surf contest with magic.

As they say, be careful what you wish for, you might get it.
posted by 445supermag at 7:58 AM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


I saw Fury Road for the same reason, and I loved it, but I'm kind of put off about being expected to play this game with Ghostbusters. I'll probably enjoy it when I get around to seeing it, but I LOATHE the idea that I am making some sort of feminist statement by seeing it or have some obligation to enjoy it. I don't want YOU ARE POLITICALLY AND MORALLY OBLIGATED TO CONSUME THIS to be the new default marketing strategy, especially for light summer comedies. Not everything has to be turned into some with-us-or-against-us declaration.

You make a good point, but I feel like in the current political climate, every choice we make is a declaration, and that includes abstention. Every purchase we make, or decide not to make, is a political statement. Our involvement is forced upon us by the mere fact of our existence, and not even ignorance is an excuse. In this case, we can only judge Ghostbusters by its political connotations; whether it succeeds as a means of entertainment is downright irrelevant. So we vote with our money, one ticket at a time, solely to raise its domestic gross over that of more regressive movies.
posted by Faint of Butt at 8:07 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Ghostbusters the movie was already a remake of a (terrible) live action children's show.

If by remake you mean "coincidentally had the same name, and had to pay to license the name," then yes.

If by "terrible" you mean "featured the greatest comic performance by a man in an ape suit," then yes.
posted by maxsparber at 8:13 AM on May 26, 2016 [11 favorites]


Max Landis has repeatedly proved himself to be something of an asshole (see his tirade against female filmmaker Lexi Alexander) so I'm not much inclined to pay attention to anything he says. Lexi Alexander is a delight to follow on Twitter, despite you feeling angry as well about how shittily women are treated in Hollywood all across the board.
posted by Kitteh at 8:14 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


I'm no fan of remakes, and I would infinitely prefer a world where we got new properties with female leads than remakes and reboots over and over again.

So, no Fury Road then? No The Force Awakens? No My Little Pony: Friendship us is Magic? All of which were legitimately good media on their own.

Leaving aside the fact that the security involved in making a remake allows for more non-standard actions like casting a woman as the lead. If this was the first ruin of Ghostbusters, do you really think women world have been car in the lead roles?
posted by happyroach at 8:15 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


In this case, we can only judge Ghostbusters by its political connotations; whether it succeeds as a means of entertainment is downright irrelevant.

To the ticket booth everyone and pick a side!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:16 AM on May 26, 2016 [6 favorites]


I'm kind of put off about being expected to play this game with Ghostbusters

But who's expecting you to play it?

I mean, if this is part of the marketing for the movie -- then I'm also put off. But it sounds like it's a self expectation, which is no fault of the movie. And it also puts you into a weird catch-22 situation, because most movies aren't Fury Road quality, whether they star women or not. Being "put off" by the expectation that you support media starring women might make you actually less likely to support them, even though it seems like you care about better representation.

I want to support media that has better representation, too, but for me it's just one thing that can go into the "plus" column. There has to be something else that makes me want to see it; it can push me from "maybe" to "yes."
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 8:18 AM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


happyroach: There's so much potential for new stories and new universes. Even when a remake, reboot, or sequel is actually good, it's pretty rare. I loved Fury Road and Force Awakens. I have no opinion about MLP.

But most reboots, remakes, and sequels are generally crap, and we know it.
posted by SansPoint at 8:19 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?

Why weren't there female Ghostbusters in the first one? Because it was made by Ramis, Akroyd, and Murray, who had a history together (Lampoon, SCTV, SNL). And who's making this one? Three SNL alums, plus a fourth who was in a big movie with one of the three. It's not like they drew names from a hat.
posted by GhostintheMachine at 8:19 AM on May 26, 2016 [7 favorites]


GhostintheMachine I'm now picturing Jane Curtin and Gilda Radner as Ghostbusters, and now I want to invent time travel to make this happen.
posted by SansPoint at 8:21 AM on May 26, 2016 [35 favorites]


I don't feel a need for another Ghostbusters movie. But I will go see Ghostbusters because Melissa McCarthy is awesome. And yes, the trailer sucks. But is has been well established that Melissa McCarthy trailers always suck and have nothing to do with the quality of the actual movie.
posted by yeolcoatl at 8:22 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


I find myself in the camp of thinking the original Ghostbusters was pretty good. I imagine it was revolutionary for its time, but I didn't see it until 4 years ago. For former SNL stars making movies, I liked Wayne's World more. It was fun, but nothing special and the cringeworthy moments (basically every time they had Bill Murray and Sigourney Weaver onscreen together during the first half of the movie) detracted a lot from the otherwise funny bits.

So I have great hopes for this one. I think there's a decent chance that, as long as it avoids the uncomfortable interpersonal stuff that made me squirm with the first one, I'll actually like it better.

With all that said, I'm not super enthusiastic about seeing it. I hate assholes like what's his face (I'm being too lazy to go back to the FPP) for making me feel like I need to consume certain material if I don't want assholes like them crashing the party every time. (I ended up buying the new Baldur's Gate expansion because of Gamergate hate. It was ok, but I probably wouldn't have picked it up if there hadn't been death threats issued because of it.)

I hate that consuming media is political these days. White guys, we had our run, don't shit in the punch bowl now that other people have a chance to drink from it. (See also: Gamergate, Rabid Puppies, etc.)

I'm honestly tempted to buy a matinee ticket to a cheap showing and then wait for this to come out on netflix.
posted by Hactar at 8:23 AM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?

Why weren't there female Ghostbusters in the first one?


I was responding to the comment that new Ghostbusters was for the kids of today, so why not mix up the genders? The SNL alumna aspect doesn't matter.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:24 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Why weren't there female Ghostbusters in the first one? Because it was made by Ramis, Akroyd, and Murray, who had a history together (Lampoon, SCTV, SNL).

Well, yes. But they also had a history with a lot of women and for some reason it didn't occur to them that any one of those women could be Ghostbusters. So it's not just that there happened to be three guys and that's the end of the story. There happened to be three guys who did not consider Jane Curtain or Gilda Radner or Laraine Newman to be lead actresses, despite their extraordinary talent, and neither did they consider Karen Allen, Sarah Holcomb, Sarah Holcomb, Cindy Morgan, P. J. Soles, Sean Young, Beverly D'Angelo, or any of the many, many exceptional female comic performers who had supporting roles in Animal House, Caddyshack, Stripes, and Vacation before Ghostbusters came out.

I mean, this is a roster of extraordinary talent, and they were relegated to the sidelines. That's not just some dudes who like to work with each other. That's institutional sexism.
posted by maxsparber at 8:30 AM on May 26, 2016 [38 favorites]


I myself am being whiny about this remake of an icon not because there's teh wimmins in it, but because of the "re-" bit. There are SO MANY good stories out there waiting to be made into movies! (To say nothing of new stories we have never heard before...)

Like, why not film "Alanna" by Tamora Pierce? There's plenty of sword-swinging and stuff, and a young woman gets to change the course of her life and pursue her destiny. It might be a bit late for my oldest daughter, but the other kids (boys and girls alike) would love it!
posted by wenestvedt at 8:31 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


Entitlement is right. There is no need to make a scene about a movie coming out you think you won't like just quietly choose not to go (without uploading a 10 minute rant to your youtube channel about why you aren't going). This film is of no interest to me so I won't watch it, I'll give my money to something else I feel deserves it. I won't however seek to wreck it for people who do want to see it by spewing my opinion aggressively in internet comments.
posted by Shikantaza at 8:32 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


I am sure that a lot of you take issue with the fact that this is a remake. On the other hand, there are literally dozens of remakes and reboots per year, and none of them have raised the sort of hue and cry this has.

And it's not just that this is an especially beloved property. The Crow has a solid cult audience, as does an American Werewolf in London. Dirty Dancing was a mainstream success. The Magnificent Seven is one of the most beloved films of all time. All slated for remakes. None generating the sort of public "I'll never see this, this is a betrayal" that Ghostbusters is.

what's causing this? Oh, I would say the endemic nerd sexism that caused the same furious public responses to Mad Max and Star Wars because of their prominent female leads. If you simply don't want to see the film because you don't see remakes for whatever reason, fine, but that's orthogonal to this discussion, and distracts from it.
posted by maxsparber at 8:38 AM on May 26, 2016 [38 favorites]


But it sounds like it's a self expectation, which is no fault of the movie.

I think marketers will take all the wrong lessons away from a successful Ghostbusters showing. It'll be read less as "people want more diverse media" and more as "movies that generate lots of clickbait and controversy and internet outrage = $$$" I do think we will start seeing marketing for movies, TV, etc. that tries to tap into that stuff and turn it into an obligation to consume. Ghostbusters may not be pushing it deliberately! But I am certain that studio execs, marketers, etc. are watching and figuring out how to generate this kind of conversation on purpose.
posted by almostmanda at 8:39 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


American Werewolf in London

WHAT!? Aw, shit, now I'm angry.
posted by Faint of Butt at 8:42 AM on May 26, 2016 [4 favorites]


I actually... LIKE sequals. I think part of the problem is that people want to see drama and resolution but don't really like seeing the characters they love actually happy doing non dramatic things.

I think this ideal has an impact on relationships in general- it's all about envisioning the dramatic beginnings but no tolerance for the gentle ongoing story that unfolds at a different pace. Where are the stories about people married for 50 years living happy lives and having the grandkids over for cookies? The bumps and troubles of the day to day... how to get through those.

That's where the real love is.

I like both, don't get me wrong, but I think there's a deficit for appreciating art and film that warms the heart and builds ongoing relationships with audience and envisions the characters along the way. That people fall in love with the characters in film and want to see them again is a testament to the love in our hearts.

And even the complicated characters can do much for us, like to me Ice King represents a number of dangerous people I can not let into my life for safety issues but whom I still love and understand how they got they way. There's a lot of characters that, I like seeing around.
posted by xarnop at 8:53 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


If we’re really taking votes on how Frozen 2 goes, I’d be happy to cast my vote for “leave Frozen alone and don’t make a sequel.”

There are billions of dollars in ticket and merchandise sales that talks much louder than the whole Internet put together. Someone is happily stuffing $100 bills in their ears right now happily saying "la la la I can't hear you!"

Keeps me employed, so I'm not complaining.
posted by clawsoon at 9:00 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


"So, no Fury Road then? No The Force Awakens? No My Little Pony: Friendship us is Magic? All of which were legitimately good media on their own."

None of those are remakes though. And, to be fair, neither is the new Ghostbusters. The new Ghostbusters is a reboot, not a remake since it seems to take place in it's own universe and is telling a different story.
posted by I-baLL at 9:02 AM on May 26, 2016


"It's a tough call, whether to go and watch this version of Ghostbusters 3 with popcorn and kids and stuff, or to sit all night in a dark room when it's released, face contorted in rage, composing an angry rant about how much I hate the very idea of anyone creating or watching this horrid attempt at a Ghostbusters sequel. If only there were some other alternative."

After seeing the trailers and reading possible plot leaks, I fear that the first may lead to the second.
posted by I-baLL at 9:03 AM on May 26, 2016


So, no Fury Road then?

Not a remake or reboot.

No The Force Awakens?

Not a remake or reboot.

No My Little Pony: Friendship us is Magic?

Okay, you got this one, but it's a weird example. The original toy line was created by a woman and aimed at girls, and the original cast and crew of the movies and show featured a number of women.
posted by Sangermaine at 9:04 AM on May 26, 2016


I am sure that a lot of you take issue with the fact that this is a remake. On the other hand, there are literally dozens of remakes and reboots per year, and none of them have raised the sort of hue and cry this has.


Hasn't there been a constant refrain about the lack of creativity in Hollywood and the ever-growing number of remakes, debits, and sequels for like 15 years now?
posted by Sangermaine at 9:08 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


Because if it's for the kids of today, why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?

As with some other commenters, I would have been fine with that too. But I'm also fine with the casting here, because not every movie can be a college recruitment brochure. I'm happy we get a nerdy movie featuring 4 women -- two of whom are plus-sized. One of whom is black and plus-sized: I could cosplay Patty with zero squinting or irony having the play the "black Egon" or the "fat Uhura" and that's a big fucking deal to me (even though I'm not into cosplay). Representation matters.

That doesn't mean that we don't need more Asians (especially south asian women) in sci-fi, or openly lgbt characters or deaf characters or First Nations folks, etc etc. But I don't think it makes sense to let perfect be the enemy of good, here.
posted by sparklemotion at 9:08 AM on May 26, 2016 [14 favorites]


Hasn't there been a constant refrain about the lack of creativity in Hollywood and the ever-growing number of remakes, debits, and sequels for like 15 years now?

There's been that refrain my entire life, and probably for the entire history of film, from the umpteen million Jaws sequels to the fact that The Maltese Falcon that we know of is actually the third version of the book that was filmed.

But the general complaint that Hollywood is not creative enough is not the same as the specific complaint that this particular remake is somehow ruining everything because ... well, because women.
posted by maxsparber at 9:11 AM on May 26, 2016 [8 favorites]


I plan to go see Ghostbusters 2 because I love stupid comedies and I like Jristen Wiig and Melissaa McCarthy, I hope everyone is ok with that. Wait, no, actually I don't care what anyone thinks about it.
posted by bq at 9:15 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


And I should note that I am sympathetic to people who say "Why remake this, do something new." I will point out that the director, Paul Fieg, has a long track record of creating entirely new properties featuring women in the lead (often with women as the screenwriters), including Bridesmaids, The Heat, and Spy.

But there is still an institutional prejudice against women, still that old holler of women can't be funny, or they can't be funny in the way men are funny, and so if a new film came along that was like Ghostbusters, there would still be a tendency to scout around for today's Bill Murray under the presumption that you just get a male comic lead for a film like this.

This serves as a sort of proof of concept. Take the same film, make it with women, and show that they can be just as funny in exactly the same sort of material. I think it's sort of important.
posted by maxsparber at 9:16 AM on May 26, 2016 [12 favorites]


Actially, the Force Awakens is a reboot. It basically wipes out the extended universe of canon set up on a shitload of official novels, comics, and other material about Han, Leia, Luke, and their activities/events in the universe post ROTJ.
posted by joyceanmachine at 9:17 AM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


It basically wipes out the extended universe of canon set up on a shitload of official novels, comics, and other material about Han, Leia, Luke, and their activities/events in the universe post ROTJ.

I'm not a Star Wars Geek (or even a Star Wars Person, really), but I really, really loved The Force Awakens. A friend of mine is absolutely a Star Wars Geek and didn't go into detail about why he hated it, but ... yeah, that checks out.

The attachments people develop to media are really interesting to me, because generally-speaking, I just don't. The idea that the AVGN won't go see the Ghostbusters reboot because it's tarnishing an image -- and that he feels he has to tell people about it -- is insane and absurd. It's like the "same-sex marriage will ruin hetero marriage" argument.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:27 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


short clip of the cast on ellen.
posted by twist my arm at 9:27 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Sometimes I find it a little exhausting hanging out in the part of fandom that is all about "more!"--no, really, your WWII barista AU, the twenty-first one on the archive, is pointless--but I'd rather be over there than in the male-dominated scarcity-driven segment, where you can't imagine anyone having anything that's not being taken from someone else.
posted by praemunire at 9:28 AM on May 26, 2016 [9 favorites]


I can't engage with any fan culture any more... games, movies, TV, SF/F, whatever. It's all just a thin veneer of interest in the subject and then an endless ocean of incredibly toxic negativity, drama, and bullshit.

How many times has the following happened to me since the internet happened?

1. "Oh hey, here's Thing that I've heard about. Thing seems pretty awesome."
2. **click click click** "Look at all the cool fan art and fic! This is great!"
3. **click click click** "What? I don't . . ."
4. **click click** "These people are insane."
5. I lose interest in Thing, because Thing reminds me of hideous sex art, or death threats to creators, or some kid getting bullied into a suicide attempt.
posted by Countess Elena at 9:33 AM on May 26, 2016 [9 favorites]


And I should note that I am sympathetic to people who say "Why remake this, do something new." I will point out that the director, Paul Fieg, has a long track record of creating entirely new properties featuring women in the lead (often with women as the screenwriters), including Bridesmaids, The Heat, and Spy.

Also, the way Hollywood often works is along the lines of "Hey, Big Creative Star, if we can put you in this lowest-common-denominator proven property, we'll float you some cash and distribution for your passion project." I have no doubt that Ghostbusters is "the day job" for the four leads.
posted by infinitewindow at 9:36 AM on May 26, 2016 [4 favorites]


They even prepared for the possibility that they couldn't get the title by recording a bunch of alternate takes of the commercial in the film with names like "Ghost Smashers," etc.

Does this article mention any other examples of the alternate titles? (I can't view the page from work browser.)

Because I have a vague childhood memory of seeing either a trailer or poster with the title Ghost Chasers, and then being very confused several months later when I started seeing commercials for something called Ghostbusters. (Similarly, shortly before this, I remember seeing a teaser trailer for the new Star Wars movie, which at the time was called Revenge of the Jedi. When eventually I learned of the revised title, I thought it sounded weak in comparison.)
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:44 AM on May 26, 2016


Atom Eyes The article mentions "Ghost Stoppers," and "Ghost Blasters," and I think "Ghost Chasers" was in the video, but Sony gave it a smackdown, so I can't say for sure.
posted by SansPoint at 9:46 AM on May 26, 2016


I was going to make a joke about how nobody remembers Ghostbusters II, but it looks like we've got a live example of that in the thread. Rolfe et al. are complaining about how only Ackroyd and Ramis have the right to make a Ghostbusters movie, and any movie without them is destined to fail, ignores both the fact that they did make a sequel that was NOT GOOD and didn't really have much success with anything in the decades afterwards. Even if Ramis was still around, I have no reason to believe that their version of Ghostbusters 3 would be any good at all. And that's probably why Murray has been so non-committal. I bet he read Ackroyd's pitch years ago, saw how terrible it was, and ran away screaming.

Now on to the parallel argument - why does this have to be a reboot/remake/rewhatever instead of a new property? The fact the Fieg/Whig/McCarthy have, in one combo or another, made 2 smash hits that were original ideas before they made this one makes me suspect that they actually wanted to do it.

And yes, I would love to see an even more inclusive cast. I'm growing more and more frustrated with things like the Marvel movies, where super heroes are White Men, Black Men, or White Women. Anyone else need not apply. But something about that argument - that this movie should be MORE inclusive, and not just monogendered - against this particular movie facing it's very particular criticisms, comes across as disingenuous. It really feels like the kind of logic trap some 4chan goon would make.
posted by thecjm at 9:50 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


Maybe the new trailer doesn't look that funny because the original Ghostbusters wasn't that funny, either? I mean, it was amusing, and certainly very entertaining. But it was a big hit because it was an action-adventure movie made by funny people, not because it was all that hilarious. There are great moments: the Marshmallow Man, "It's true, this man has no dick," etc. But there are long stretches of movie where nothing funny happens at all. Murray's shtick of womanizing is really not funny at all anymore, if it ever was, and the ghost blowjob (really?) was at best pandering to thirteen-year-old boys. So I don't see why this version can't end up a lot funnier than the original, even if it turns out to be more of a special-effects-heavy action extravaganza.
posted by rikschell at 9:55 AM on May 26, 2016 [8 favorites]


I like Ghostbusters II. No, it's not as good as the original, but I still like it. Seeing it in the theater at age 4 might have helped.
posted by SansPoint at 9:55 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


Remember when you could just be interested in a movie, or not interested, and it was totally okay and not newsworthy either way? But now it feels like we're constantly drawing battle lines around every random thing that was supposed to be fun, once upon a time. Even if this guy is not sexist in the least, he could have just, y'know, just quietly *not reviewed the movie*, but by making the decision to announce that he wasn't going to review the movie, intentionally or no he positioned himself on one side of a culture war. (I suspect intentionally, you'd have to be pretty tone deaf to not know how that statement would be interpreted in the current cultural climate.)

I was super excited when I first heard about the remake, not least because of the gender switch, this is a talented cast and it sounds like a lot of fun, the fact that it's a chance for women to take center stage just makes it that much better. Then the trailer hit and... eh. Parts of it are great and parts of it are just... a little lazy I guess? So while I'm still planning to see it I've moderated my expectations a bit and I'm not as enthusiastic as I was. But as soon as the MRA types started complaining about it, it became Yet Another Issue for Social Debate and I felt like I had to sigh and put on my fatigues and line up on the opposite side, however I actually felt about it.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 10:24 AM on May 26, 2016 [6 favorites]


I liked the version of Higher and Higher that features in the Statue of Liberty scene in Ghostbusters 2. As a kid I thought it was neat that joy could be a source of supernatural power.
posted by clockzero at 10:30 AM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


Just went and watched the two trailers for the new Ghostbusters. I actually don't get why people don't think it looks funny. There were some decent gags in there! The original Ghostbusters were all losers (Venkman just never realized he was a loser), and as such we were supposed to be sympathetic to them as an audience. In that regard, I don't think the original holds up that well. Egon and Winston are good characters with not much to do while the camera focuses on Murray, Ackroyd, and Moranis, who all play jerks.
posted by rikschell at 10:43 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Because if it's for the kids of today, why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?


I find it interesting that there can be thousands of films with male leads, and the reaction is at most a resigned "Whatcha gonna do" shrug. Put a film with four female leads in it, and we get "Hey! Hey! We need more DIVERSITY! I know, let's put some MEN in the title role!"

Seriously, like I've said before: we've had 60+ years of men dominating the casts of everything from action adventure to comedy to science fiction. You know what would be fair? 30 years of women being the dominant leads of all Hollywood films. Hell, I'm not even asking for parity- 30 years would be fine.

But no, I guess that just isn't diverse". Not if it means having men take a secondary role for once.
posted by happyroach at 10:44 AM on May 26, 2016 [15 favorites]


Mod note: One deleted. The new Ghostbusters already has people of different races and sexes in it, and it's bizarre and looks almost like trolling to choose this as a place to re-stage a fight about what "fairness" involves in something like this.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 10:50 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


I LOATHE the idea that I am making some sort of feminist statement by seeing it or have some obligation to enjoy it. I don't want YOU ARE POLITICALLY AND MORALLY OBLIGATED TO CONSUME THIS

I mostly just want to put some money in the pockets of women I think are funny and deserve to make more movies. I don't really have any other way to vote on what Hollywood does. And the movie may or may not be awesome, but I have seen some shit movies in my time, so I can take it.

Plus my kid (male) wants to see it. He likes Ghostbusters. He wants to see what they do with better special effects and monsters. Gender of the 'Busters is irrelevant to him.

(also: most of the shit movies I've seen do not feature Chris Hemsworth in a blatant cheesecake role, and goddammit, it's my turn to get pandered to).

No one wrings their fucking hands about dudes that love a shit movie like Sucker Punch bringing civilzation down. But god forbid a woman-fronted property is not the Best Movie Ever Made.
posted by emjaybee at 10:52 AM on May 26, 2016 [18 favorites]


Because if it's for the kids of today, why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?

You know, I was talking about this a bit in FanFare, and it really made me think - I think there's not-shitty reasons to be at least vaguely against this weird kind of "insert POC here" replacement diversity technique on old movies or adaptations of comic books or what have you - where the character exists pretty much as it did in the original, without any different life experiences, that would have come about if the character ACTUALLY were of the ethnicity and gender that is being suggested. It's the same thing as the female man-izing Bond suggestion, where the woman is using male underwear models or whatever. But you're putting a woman in a masculine role, without asking "well, what's the woman's motivation to be mistreating underwear models in the first place?" You can't just put a woman into a role that became sexist because of sexist culture and then have her do the same shit, but reversed because she's a lady, and not have it raise a few eyebrows. Because they're missing the culture that created the sexist casting in the first place, but still existing in that culture.

So you have the thing where, say, POC are being put into existing characters, and they are essentially white characters who happen to be POC, rather than being organically POC characters, because they exist as they were made with little alteration. And that....really does have its own issues.
posted by corb at 10:58 AM on May 26, 2016 [4 favorites]


Remember when you could just be interested in a movie, or not interested, and it was totally okay and not newsworthy either way?

Try to explain to the kids how back in the pre internet days we used to just watch movies and TV shows without taking a stand in some sort of war. We could also just have different opinions about things. It was a weird time, kids.
posted by bongo_x at 11:04 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


What's getting these guys out of the woodwork to bitch about Ladybusters isn't that it's a reboot -- it's because it's being rebooted to feature -gasp- women. If that weren't the case, then folks like James Rolfe would have been just as passionate in coming out against TMNT (2014), Godzilla (2014 and 1998), Pete's fucking Dragon (2016), or The Magnificent Seven (2016).

I had to read this several times to make sure that you were actually suggesting that James Rolfe isn't angry about enough topics.
posted by dances with hamsters at 11:07 AM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


It's the same thing as the female man-izing Bond suggestion, where the woman is using male underwear models or whatever.

So are you not going to be needing those male underwear models, because
posted by beerperson at 11:24 AM on May 26, 2016 [4 favorites]


So you have the thing where, say, POC are being put into existing characters, and they are essentially white characters who happen to be POC, rather than being organically POC characters, because they exist as they were made with little alteration. And that....really does have its own issues.

Eh, depends on the particular examples and there's little reason the story itself can't be adjusted to fit the change in a character's sex or race.

The new Ghostbusters is odd for copying the racial dynamics exactly as the original, i.e. 3 white and 1 black on the main team. Add in that the black character specifically is the 'street smart' and gender flip with racial stasis is just weird as hell.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:24 AM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


So you have the thing where, say, POC are being put into existing characters, and they are essentially white characters who happen to be POC, rather than being organically POC characters, because they exist as they were made with little alteration.

Ok, but, see, the problem is usually that the author/creator/whatever never paused to consider the essential whiteness or maleness of the character, and just rolled with the default. Is there something SO fundamental to the character that they MUST be white and male? With very rare exceptions, the answer is no.

So yeah, I'm happy when people challenge that default, even if it means changing the perceptions slightly of the character (see: Nick Fury), because anything that gets us away from the concept of white cis-het maleness as the default, and everything else is "other," is a plus in my book.
posted by shiu mai baby at 11:29 AM on May 26, 2016 [6 favorites]


Is there something SO fundamental to the character that they MUST be white and male? With very rare exceptions, the answer is no.

What I mean is more like - okay, so the character of James Bond is pretty much Entitled White Dude, right? Sleeping his way across everything and letting his sidekicks get killed without considering the impact of his existence. And I'd argue that the sense of entitlement itself is predicated on whiteness - on being the Default Person and considering every other person as lesser.

So when Idris Elba was considered, sure, there were some assholes who were just racist 'nooooooooo' votes, and fuck those guys. Is there any reason you can't have a black super agent badass? No! But at the same time, people pointed out, "Hey, a black Bond is not going to be the same as a white Bond - he's not going to be as entitled, he's not going to be as much of a jackass, he's going to have more empathy for people because you can't make him magically the only black guy ever not to have experienced any racism, and experiencing suffering makes you more cognizant of other people's suffering. You can have him be a badass, but not an asshole-of-pure-privilege badass."

And that's kind of what I mean - that it's bizarre when people don't consider that second bit, that "Is this characterization consistent with what the actual character would have had to go through to get here, or is it like someone did a find/replace on the original script and just dropped a POC in there and figured they were done?" When you have characters of privilege played by people who wouldn't have experienced that.

Brandon Blatcher accurately points out that it wouln't be hard to change the characterization - but for some reason, possibly because Fan Service, they just don't.
posted by corb at 11:38 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Sam Wilson is his own Captain America. Jane Foster is her own Thor. That's just two recent examples. This idea that it's just inserting gender- or race-flipping with no change to the whiteness or maleness of the character just isn't true.
posted by zombieflanders at 11:38 AM on May 26, 2016 [7 favorites]


The new Ghostbusters is odd for copying the racial dynamics exactly as the original, i.e. 3 white and 1 black on the main team. Add in that the black character specifically is the 'street smart' and gender flip with racial stasis is just weird as hell.

I think that it's fair to assume that at least some of the casting here was intended to make a statement. And when you line up these 4 ladies and compare it to these 4 dudes, that statement is pretty clear.*

But I get that it seems hinky to go with the "street smart negro" in 2016, and the first trailer did not look good in that respect. But, it sounds like Leslie Jones had a fair amount of agency in the creation of her character and is happy with the portrayal. Also, the character seems better in the second trailer so I've decided to reserve judgment on that point until I see it.

*fun and tangentially related fact: I googled "ghostbusters original poster" to find the poster from the original movie and most of what I found didn't even have Winston on it. So yay progress?
posted by sparklemotion at 11:40 AM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Sleeping his way across everything and letting his sidekicks get killed without considering the impact of his existence. And I'd argue that the sense of entitlement itself is predicated on whiteness

Right, but even in the case of Bond, the character has changed pretty dramatically over the last couple decades -- the blatant sexism that was so fundamental to the character in the 60s and 70s ("Man talk, my dear!" *spank*) has all but evaporated from Bond, who in the modern version is still emotionally damaged by the loss of Vesper.

I would agree with you if the Connery and Moore Bonds were the standard, but there's nothing inherent to the way Craig has played the character that demands the character is a white male.
posted by shiu mai baby at 11:54 AM on May 26, 2016 [10 favorites]


Oh, that's actually nice to hear! I haven't seen the latest Bonds, and watched Roger Moore under protest.

Maybe the answer is "don't have asshat characters, and don't remake movies that have asshat characters in them, just make new movies, you can do it."
posted by corb at 11:58 AM on May 26, 2016


I've got a friend (not me!) who capital-L Loves Ghostbusters, in the same intimate, caught-it-at-exactly-the-right-time-in-life way that I love The Breakfast Club. He is proper enthusiastic for this film. Worst case scenario? It's average-to-bad, and the glorious comedy touchstone of his youth remains untouched. The pseudo-canonisation of GB is super-weird to me personally, as it was always this really good '80s film I hadn't seen in years. As a casual (can there be any other sort?) Indiana Jones fan, Shia LaBeouf as IJ Jnr in a film I've never bothered watching is more offensive to me than Ghostbridesmaidsfuckyeah coud ever be. Seriously, what is wrong with people?
posted by comealongpole at 12:03 PM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


Maybe the answer is "don't have asshat characters, and don't remake movies that have asshat characters in them, just make new movies, you can do it."

It made me feel better -- well, not better, just as if I understood, which is shaped the same as "feeling better" -- to realize that all these remakes and reboots are not due to a lack of creativity. Amazing new ideas and new artists are breaking against the rocks of Hollywood every day. It's just that big-budget movies are basically investment vehicles, and in hard times the investors look for what's safest. Formulas are safe. Reboots are safe. White leading actors are safe -- not that POC actors are actually that risky, it's just that that's what's widely believed. Movies get less exciting; audiences are less excited; costs keep rising; investors want safer movies . . .
posted by Countess Elena at 12:07 PM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


I saw the internet going nuts on the idea of Gillian Anderson as the new James/Jane Bond. And I think she'd be awesome as a secret agent and could totally do such a thing. But as corb points out, James Bond is a specific character in a specific milieu, so you can't just cast the new Bond as a woman, or non-white for that matter, and not have that change. What he represents is quite tied in with his upper-crust white maledom, so switching that out takes a little more care than a hashtag and a burst of fannish enthusiasm seems to concern. He is of the Establishment, and it's not that the character couldn't work, it's just there's more to it than that.

The new Ghostbusters? They're new characters, so there's none of that concern. Though they are of course kind of in a Catch-22 with making the fourth one black in that after getting such high levels of talent with the central three (and if you remember the orginal movie, they don't hire Ernie Hudson until about an hour in, if not later), the only thing worse than getting a black actress for the non-scientist would be not doing so.

But at the end of the day, I find fan entitlement as being the worst in all its forms. Fans who demand their personal shipping preferences be reflected in the text (*cough*Harmonians*cough*) might be making a stink about a much smaller concern than fans reacting to a new movie as if the option wasn't available to not see it, but it all stems from the same level of ownership that should never reflect reality.

Fan entitlement was never more exemplified than with the recent fan who hassled Amy Schumer, and that's what all of this sort of stuff is - 'do our bidding. I like you, give me what I want. I paid for you, you owe me.' Fans are the worst. Even the worst things can occasionally be right, but that doesn't mean they should be listened to. Unfortunate, then, that so much of the internet is about promoting the mindset of fandom.
posted by gadge emeritus at 12:08 PM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Ghostbridesmaidsfuckyeah

Bridesmaids was totally hilarious so this would be wonderful
posted by clockzero at 12:09 PM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Add in that the black character specifically is the 'street smart' and gender flip with racial stasis is just weird as hell.

It would be great if the reason why she knows the streets is that she has a PhD in sociology.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 12:54 PM on May 26, 2016 [7 favorites]


> The "I hate this because it's wrecking my childhood" argument is such transparent bullshit.

Going back and watching most of the shit I liked when I was a kid as an adult has been a melancholy experience. In the mid-'90s TNT started re-running Dukes Of Hazzard and Knight Rider on Friday or Saturday nights and I thought it would be great to down a few beers and get my nostalgia on. As it turned out, there wasn't enough beer in the world to dial my critical faculties back to the level they were at when I enjoyed those shows. A few weeks ago I killed some time with my 7 year-old nephew by watching old Inspector Gadget episodes on YouTube. You cannot ruin that shit because it was *fucking terrible* to begin with. Transformers, same thing...the only thing the cartoons had over the movies is that they at least saw fit to leave out jokes about sex and dogs peeing on things.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:55 PM on May 26, 2016 [9 favorites]


It would be great if the reason why she knows the streets is that she has a PhD in sociology.

According to earlier reports, the character of Patty knows a lot about history of New York Streets because she's a toll booth worker in the subway and has a lot of time to read books. So yay she reads and is self educated, that's great! But would it have been so terrible to swap in the black character for one of the college educated scientists who all know each other?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:58 PM on May 26, 2016 [8 favorites]


A few weeks ago I killed some time with my 7 year-old nephew by watching old Inspector Gadget episodes on YouTube. You cannot ruin that shit because it was *fucking terrible* to begin with.

And yet, somehow...
posted by Faint of Butt at 12:59 PM on May 26, 2016


No one wrings their fucking hands about dudes that love a shit movie like Sucker Punch bringing civilzation down.

:raises hand::

Any praise for Snyder is another brick in the road to the apocalypse.
posted by Sangermaine at 1:02 PM on May 26, 2016 [9 favorites]


It would be great if the reason why she knows the streets is that she has a PhD in sociology.

I like the spirit of the idea, but can attest from extensive first-hand experience that sociology phds do not know the streets real well as a group
posted by clockzero at 1:31 PM on May 26, 2016 [6 favorites]


I still wish Leslie Jones had played Neil DeGrasse Tyson in a skirt.
posted by pxe2000 at 1:34 PM on May 26, 2016


Because if it's for the kids of today, why not mix up the genders and race in the remake?

This is actually another thread i've seen twirling along online, and it's something that comes up every time something reasonably progressive gets done in media.

Basically, "ok, you went part of the way, why not even further to the point i think you should?" and the problem is that's a chasm.

This is already a hugely controversial move. Is that sad? Yea, but it's moving the needle forward.

I've seen this happen locally to friends making art/music projects/spaces/events and it's crab bucket as fuck. On one side you have a bunch of regressive assholes howling about how it's not fair/bad/will suck, and on the other side you have a bunch of people on ostensibly the "right team" saying it's not progressive enough and do better.

And seriously, i've seen a lot of that about this. Not as much as i've seen MRA whinytears, but a decent amount.

I seriously quit several websites/left groups i had previously really liked because i couldn't take the "yea it's good, but ehhhhh it could be better" about inclusiveness/social justice topics in art/film/music. And as someone who creates things, it's really discouraging and stiffling. You know you're going to have haters, but then you go and even the people who are ostensibly on your side are saying it's okkk but it would be better if you did a backflip through the hoops.

Like, for fucks sake, this probably almost didn't get made as is. It reminds me of people complaining that max was in Fury Road at all instead of it just being entirely about Furiosa.
posted by emptythought at 1:37 PM on May 26, 2016 [21 favorites]


I seriously quit several websites/left groups i had previously really liked because i couldn't take the "yea it's good, but ehhhhh it could be better" about inclusiveness/social justice topics in art/film/music.

Someone on a certain website (I am not naming names but I am typing on it right now) said in 2008, upon the election of President Obama, "Meh, get back to me when we have a president who grew up speaking AAVE." I honestly don't remember who it was, but it has stuck with me this long as a prime example of the circular firing squad.
posted by Countess Elena at 2:25 PM on May 26, 2016 [14 favorites]


I have no patience with the "maybe this doesn't look funny because Ghostbusters isn't funny" crowd. Ghostbusters is funny as hell. Venkman putting the moves on Dana looks creepy now and of the ghost blowjob let us speak no more, but it's a great film overall. It's to me what Star Wars is to a lot of people; somehow this movie was just fucking cool to me in a way that nothing had been before, and it laid down some bedrock for who I grew up to be, for better or worse. And it holds up.

I personally think the trailer does look funny, but I admit much of that is just seeing the actors. I love Leslie Jones, love Kristen Wiig, like Melissa McCarthy and Thor a lot, and Kate McKinnon! I don't think anyone on TV is funnier than she is now. How could I not want to see this? I do, obviously.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:21 PM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


Comparing the Ghostbusters hate campaign with Frozen shipping is a bit like apples and oranges. Brigading millions of downvotes rather than clicking back to work after twenty seconds is, well, work.

Meanwhile, shippers are gonna ship. After two generations of it media companies have delivered on it a handful of times, in spite of growing wink wink nudge nudge at cons. Elsa is eligible because the number of princess not paired off can be counted on one hand. They are even giving Reilly a "date."

"Why not ..." is less entitlement and more frustration that we get whitewashing and marginalization more than good characters. For LGBTQ people, "Why not?" for ambiguous characters was 90% of what we got from mainstream media, with half the rest a punchline or shocking twist.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 4:03 PM on May 26, 2016 [6 favorites]


Metafilter: a prime example of the circular firing squad.
posted by P.o.B. at 4:27 PM on May 26, 2016 [4 favorites]


On the one side, a twitter hashtag, a form of advocacy with a half-life measured in weeks.

On the other side, a multi-billion dollar conglomerate out of a William Gibson novel with disproportionate influences on the tastes and values of people under the age of 30 around the world.

Who is really pressuring whom?
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 5:28 PM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


I was sort of surprised at how beloved the original Ghostbusters is to so many people. I haven't actually seen it in whole since it came out but I remember being funny in parts but I was never that big a fan of that kind of snide 80s humor. The special effects were neat for their time but I doubt that they've aged well.
posted by octothorpe at 5:50 PM on May 26, 2016


It was about six months ago that I started seeing entertainment headlines at the Huffington Post about the new Ghostbusters movie. You remember, stuff like "This will be your new favorite movie!" and "New Ghostbusters to smash the patriarchy!" Clearly, there was a segment of liberals so enthralled at the very notion of women stepping into a franchise that had heretofore been a Boy's Club that the actual film itself was an afterthought. Then the trailer dropped and it looked... well, pretty cruddy.

It's not easy to give up on that type of emotional investment. Do you know how much I expected The Phantom Menace to be not just a great movie, but one of the greatest films of all time? (Yes, people expected that.) Clearly it wasn't. Heck, I remember being a kid and convincing myself that Batman Forever was going to blow the first two Batman movies out of the water ("Batman and Jim Carrey, my two favorite things, together at last!") Sometimes, things just don't work out.

Fast forward to today -- I'm a regular non-sexist guy who owns all the blu-rays of The Legend of Korra and loves Rey and Imperator Furiosa. I even hope they Give Elsa A Girlfriend. Being suddenly accused of sexism because I think the new Ghostbusters looks like... well, crud, is completely unacceptable to me. And I get it, women want more movies with female heroes who get to act brave and silly and dumb and smart and gross. So do I. That doesn't mean that Ghostbusters is going to be good, or that all the people giving it a thumbs-down on Youtube are misogynists.

Let's all calm down and watch some Steven Universe. I think there's a new episode on tonight, in fact.
posted by ELF Radio at 6:06 PM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


I do think it's pretty weird that Elsa has been deemed gay specifically because she sung that one song about coming out of the closet...about her snow powers. We have zero idea if the girl has sexual chemistry with anyone of either gender because all she does is hang out with snow creatures and her sister, and one hopes she doesn't have sexual chemistry with her sister. For all we know, she's the first Disney asexual royal character, and either way she's had other shit traumatizing her so looking for someone to bang clearly hasn't been a priority.

I just had some terrible dirty thoughts come into my mind involving snow that Elsa could do and I am shutting them down.

I'm fine with Elsa being gay or not gay or whatever, but hell, I just want to see the girl have some sexual mojo towards anyone before we make that distinction.
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:08 PM on May 26, 2016 [5 favorites]


That doesn't mean that... all the people giving it a thumbs-down on Youtube are misogynists.

a ha ha ha ha ha ha. all the gender neutral "people" of youtube. right.

Men Are Sabotaging The Online Reviews Of TV Shows Aimed At Women (h/t)

this is not science, but go with it. i'm just going to randomly pick 2 movies that were considered pretty shit. paul blart 2 (rotten tomatoes: 5% critics/34% audience) and transformers 4 (rt: 18/51).

paul blart 2 on youtube: 2.9 mil views. thumbs up/down-- 10.8k/1.4k.
transformers 4: 15.6 mil views. up/down-- 43.6/2.6

you know what i'm about to do, right? write down your guess first.

ghostbusters: 32.7 mil views. up/down--243.5k/844k.

and strangely, even though the force awakens, mad max, and rogue one all had the same MRA bleating, their trailers are all overwhelmingly positive. there was absolutely a concerted effort to downvote the trailer of ghostbusters. i'm glad that you enjoyed all those other female-led movies. i did too. but you do yourself no favors by getting a bee up your bonnet and deciding today is the day that you stand up for #notallmen. feel free to skip ghostbusters, you are not anti-woman if it doesn't strike your fancy. taking time out of your day to make a thing about it because you're imagining people calling you sexist though? pretty cruddy.
posted by twist my arm at 7:01 PM on May 26, 2016 [9 favorites]


you know, the funny thing is that there is a paradox inherent to complaints of a pop culture thing "ruining one's childhood," inasmuch as the complaint itself indicates that one is still a child
posted by DoctorFedora at 7:12 PM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Twist my Arm:

I always have the time to share my truth with people. The burden is worth it.
posted by ELF Radio at 7:17 PM on May 26, 2016


No, this is the sort of thing you should listen to. "People are accusing me of being sexist for not caring about the new Ghostbusters" is not your truth, it's not true at all. Nobody in this thread has called you out specifically, they haven't even said that anyone who doesn't care to see the movie is sexist

What they have said is that the demonstrative online tantruming about this film, which is clearly a response to it's gender reversed casting, is sexist. If you have not participated in that, it's not about you.

But I'll tell you what is sexist, every time: coming into a thread about a specific thing that affects women and making it all about you because you're not guilty of that thing, and you feel like somehow you personally are being implicated. That's taking a subject that affects women and turning into a discussion about how that affects men, and you specifically.

It's shitty and it absolutely is not worth sharing.
posted by maxsparber at 7:32 PM on May 26, 2016 [15 favorites]


Maxsparber:

But it is about me, however tangentially. I'm a fan of James Rolfe and I completely agree with his reasons for not wanting to see this film. There are articles about him with titles such as "The Sexist Outcry Over Ghostbusters Gets Louder." If I don't believe that Rolfe is sexist, and I share his views, then I'm perfectly justified in commenting. (By your logic, I shouldn't comment on Donald Trump and his insane candidacy because I'm neither a Muslim trying to enter the country nor an immigrant from Mexico?)

Ghostbusters is a movie intended for a general audience, it is not a "specific thing that affects women." There's a funny degree of disconnect in the article being specifically discussed here -- the writer says that the new Ghostbusters is not for the old fans, the 35 year-old men like Rolfe -- it's for the younger generation. So Rolfe says if the movie is not for him, he won't see it. To which his detractors reply -- that's wrong, that's damaging, you're sexist, you should want to see it anyway.
posted by ELF Radio at 7:49 PM on May 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Ghostbusters the live action movie never did all that much for me. I mean, it's the sort of movie I'd leave on if I ran across it flipping channels, which is well better than average in my personal ratings system, but I wouldn't actively seek it out. The cartoon, on the other hand, had moments of pure brilliance (and moments of pure sewage because it was a network produced cartoon and we can't have everything.) That's the version I actually have nostalgia for.
posted by Karmakaze at 7:50 PM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


LGBTQ people can't win when it comes to interpreting characters. We're either jumping to a conclusion based on ambiguity (Elsa), not looking at a character close enough (Dumbledore), or pushing a gay agenda onto relationships that can be equivalently described as platonic (Garnet.) And there's a double-standard that few people object when ambiguous characters are interpreted as straight.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 8:12 PM on May 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


elsa is an animated character. she must be given chemistry. did all the m/f couples in all the disney movies before this, all the animated fucking characters, have to do a chemistry test? did you worry when you walked into the lion king that simba and nala had chemistry? do you think that's something kids care about walking into the theater?

and, it's a fucking disney movie-- "sexual mojo," "someone to bang," "other shit traumatizing her" "sexual chemistry with HER SISTER"-- the fuck? IT'S A FUCKING DISNEY MOVIE THERE WILL BE NO STUPID BANGING. you're doing the thing where you're way oversexualizing even the possibility of a queer character and that's pretty standard queerphobia (even got the incest jab in). even if you're handwringing in the more "liberal" ("maybe she's ace you don't know, i'm more inclusive") direction it's still uncalled for. i can't fucking get over this: do jasmine and aladdin have sexual chemistry. would you really have phrased it that way before this conversation?

singing a cheesy song together. holding hands and a kiss that actors don't even have to sell (maybe the animators won't be able to draw queer romance! how do 2 lady mouths fit together? is there animation technology that can handle it?). this is the disney you already know and love. we haven't "deemed" her gay and it's not weird, queer people are constantly on the lookout for anyone we can MAKE gay in our heads because we're so underrepresented. we're very attuned to subtext and superheroes coming to terms with their powers is an analogy so blunt even straight people can see it. and chuckle at how clever they are for picking up on it!

bobby's mom in xmen: "when did you first know you were a...a--" "--a mutant?"

"have you tried... not being a mutant?"

supergirl has done it several times. it's 2016 and i don't think it's clever anymore. an idea off tumblr, paraphrasing: "hey supergirl, every time you use a coming out analogy, you owe us a gay. we're up to [some exaggeratingly large number in the thousands]."

unfortunately straight people often require detailed reasons and come up with the damndest hurdles before characters can be queer. it's sad for queer kids that adults think they're being reasonable with these contortions. maybe just ask queer women if gay elsa makes sense? cuz straight people, you're not the ones who get to decide if it works or not, you just sit there and try not to be jerks about something you take for granted, thanks.
posted by twist my arm at 8:13 PM on May 26, 2016 [6 favorites]


Elsa should be gay. Dumbledore needed MORE gay. Garnet is totally gay. That's just my opinion, though.
posted by ELF Radio at 8:14 PM on May 26, 2016


"hey supergirl, every time you use a coming out analogy, you owe us a gay. we're up to [some exaggeratingly large number in the thousands]."

approved, cosigned, and highfived

I think TFA did a good job of describing fan entitlement like
But Rolfe’s video is striking because of its central presumption that he deserves to want to see it—that the movie is letting him down by not following his preferred template for a new Ghostbusters movie, which would be, as he describes, a proper Ghostbusters III where the remaining cast members return and hand things off to a new generation. In short, he would be more enthusiastic about this movie if it took his feelings as a fan into account(and, judging from the way he talks around the female cast, probably also if it had fewer women in it. You know, a reasonable number—something less reflective of the actual number of women in the world, and more reflective of Hollywood in the ’80s). He also brings up children who will know the non-sequel 2016 version more readily than the 1984 version, implying that they, too, will suffer when Sony fails to preserve his vision for Ghostbusters III.

That feels like an accurate description - fanrage with normal background-radiation misogyny - although it's possible I'm biased, and it's actually an unfair characterization.

But what she says about the Frozen hashtag is just a totally false equivalence, primarily because of the context of queer advocacy, because you have to actually advocate for queer characters - and queer people - to be allowed to exist. When she raises the spectre of fan culture becoming dangerously anti-art, promoting a form of conservative stasis rather than active engagement -- well, queer advocacy is active engagement, in my view. Wanting Ghostbusters to stay the same forever is conservative; wanting a character to develop further is transformative.

(and she says It’s not always easy to put our trust into filmmakers, or novelists, or TV showrunners but when it comes to queer characters that distrust is very fucking justified)

Never mind the fact that fans don't "control" the narrative unless the creators actually agree with them. This comes up all the goddamn time. Please believe me when I say that, when creators listen to fans, they take it with a great big grain of salt. They can usually tell when someone has a good point.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 8:53 PM on May 26, 2016 [7 favorites]


LGBTQ people can't win when it comes to interpreting characters.

Well, we can do better by not demanding our interpretation be taken as anything more than our interpretation. I don't think Elsa should be gay, but she could be gay. I definitely don't think Dumbledore needs to be more gay, considering his position, both in the narrative and as a narrative function. I've seen advocacy that all characters should be default gay unless you have a reason to write them straight, and I would certainly disagree with that.

It's all still fan entitlement, which is what the article was about instead of only being a specific thing that affects women. Because it's not just asking for queer characters to exist, it's asking for specific characters to be queer. It's still a demand, the sort that might not get into the narrative in the media, but certainly gets into the narrative around the media, something that has become more and more prominent. Simply pointing to the number of aftershows, programmes explicitly devoted to the fan narratives, something that never existed even five years ago.

It's all still 'do what I want you to do'. Just because what you want them to do is something you regard as better than the usual bigots who can't stand their childhood nostalgia to now feature women, doesn't mean it's not still fan entitlement. And as emptythought points out above, it has an impact, a stifling one.

And as for, : hey supergirl, every time you use a coming out analogy, you owe us a gay

That's dumb. The gay analogy with superheroes is only one part of it, that has some very neat parallels when you're dealing with mutants until you get to the whole 'gay people can't raze city blocks with their innate difference'. 'Coming out' is strongly associated with being LGBT, but that doesn't make it being linked to any other form of personal revelation as a case of erasure or marginalisation.
posted by gadge emeritus at 10:23 PM on May 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


Garnet is totally gay.

Garnet is a lesbian made up of two smaller lesbians.
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:57 AM on May 27, 2016 [4 favorites]


The majority of Frozen fans expect Frozen 2 to be yet another heterosexual romantic adventure because that's been a key part of the princess genre from Snow White through Frozen. It's really interesting that requests that Disney take the genre in a new direction are "entitlement" (in ways that provide more diversity) but not expectations that a movie satisfy mainstream genre expectations.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 5:44 AM on May 27, 2016 [5 favorites]


And audience feedback into serial franchises has been a thing since Sherlock Holmes.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 5:47 AM on May 27, 2016 [3 favorites]


Structural oppression matters here. Requests for the first LGBTQ lead in a popular genre are not the same as demands for yet another boys club action comedy.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 6:11 AM on May 27, 2016 [3 favorites]


that was an impressive amount of wrong to shove into such tedious a comment. but first, a man that drops this-- the idea of Gillian Anderson as the new James/Jane Bond... What he represents is quite tied in with his upper-crust white maledom, so switching that out takes a little more care than a hashtag and a burst of fannish enthusiasm seems to concern.

--into a thread without so much as the courtesy of a link shouldn't be trusted with an internet connection much less an opinion on the matter. as an example of what's wrong with fandom that fucking blows. it's a fun thing and that's all it needs to be. GILLIAN ANDERSON. ACCENT. SUIT/TUX. GUNS. 'SPLOSIONS. POSSIBLY LADIES. it's not that hard.

"i had an idea!" "oooooooh i like your idea" "idea but harry potter!" *appropriate gif reaction to idea* "i am a scientist in the area of idea and [10k words later] so yeah basically don't fuck that stalactite"

fandom is a dialogue. and sometimes ^ that happens so talking about the effects of gender/raceswapping bond on the narrative is basically a day that ends in y in fandom. it's arrogance to think fans are incapable of being at your level bro. it's completely misunderstanding fandom to think ASKING FOR THINGS is the entire point of 00-Scully. i'd say getting gillian anderson's fucking ATTENTION WITH YOUR AWESOME IDEA and IDEA GOES VIRAL as reasonable what-if scenarios in the minds of most fandom artists/creators. celebrities are fucking inundated with crap and if you're a fan it's a big fucking deal to have your hero acknowledge you or something you did.

and this very specific thing? fancasting happens every day without the media taking notice. usually it's "ok so i did Agents of Shield but all women of color" and that little fandom corner ooohs and aaaahhs over what a great idea it was to put so-and-so as fitzsimmons. do you get how much you're missing by assuming something that happened to hit your radar was a DEMAND?

frozen is a definite ask for reasons already stated. and CB and Rainbo Vagrant addressed the difference between misogynist assholes and marginalized people asking for things but you seem pretty comfy with THINGS ARE ENTITLEMENT BECAUSE I SAY SO. i know it must be hard for straight white men to constantly be called entitled but throwing it around at anyone asking for things is a bit i-know-you-are-but-what-am-i.

thanks CB, btw. i noticed nobody was talking about frozen (except to say, again, no sequel! we hate old ideas and sequels!) but i think it's interesting that you said something not controversial and got pushback anyways on old gay friendly metafilter.
posted by twist my arm at 6:40 AM on May 27, 2016 [4 favorites]


I'll admit the post-Frozen animated short that came out was kind of cute. It's basically about Elsa trying way too hard to make up for having been distant by giving Anna a 'perfect' birthday while ill enough she should have stayed in bed. It makes a nice little coda, showing that Elsa's lifelong anxiety and perfectionism didn't magically go away, but she's learning to navigate through having a support system. (I'm pretty sure Disney has come out and said Elsa does have a mental illness in the anxiety/depression range, so that subtext was deliberate.)
posted by Karmakaze at 9:54 AM on May 27, 2016 [3 favorites]


I can't engage with any fan culture any more... games, movies, TV, SF/F, whatever. It's all just a thin veneer of interest in the subject and then an endless ocean of incredibly toxic negativity, drama, and bullshit.

the most favorited comment in the thread i'm guessing. "fan culture."

games: gamergate, griefers. sf/f: racefail, puppies. tv/movies: ghostbusters-TFA-madmax hate.

is "any fan culture... an endless ocean of incredibly toxic negative etc" or is the internet toxic because of the same fucking types of entitled people over and over again? such a lazy assumption that fan culture and passion must inherently lead to bad things, or that fandom is any different than the internet/world at large including, sadly, even metafilter.

listen. for fandom fun i prefer my curated list of older queer women of color on tumblr over metafilter/fanfare. they nerd harder than we do without the bullshit. a discussion about entitled jackholes would not have compared the haves to the have-nots like this article, and wouldn't have ignored the entire point in order to shit on ghostbusters some more.

there is nothing inherently wrong with fandom that picking and choosing the right people to hang out with can't fix or mitigate. assuming entitled straight white male fan culture is all fan culture erases all the cool people who are just nerds of a thing. you're inadvertently agreeing with white male jackasses who assume all video games and comics and action movies and sf/f were made by and for them. women, PoC, and lgbtq have always been a part of fan culture and aren't generally the ones shitting it up.
posted by twist my arm at 11:52 AM on May 27, 2016


Well, we can do better by not demanding our interpretation be taken as anything more than our interpretation.

Who the everloving fuck is doing this? The hashtag isn't saying Elsa is queer, they're saying she should be queer. Very few people said that Dumbledore was definitely queer until Rowling revealed it. Which is precisely why that decision drew so much flak, because until that point the fans were left to just argue about it and that is a horrible place to be. Those arguments get real shitty, real fast. And the queer side is saying "There's reason to believe" and the straight side says "Completely impossible and how dare you."

And I mean it sounds like the same thing when you're like "people want things!" but context and motive actually does matter. TFA said "conservative stasis", and queer characters are literally the opposite of that.

Sherlock Holmes and fan influence

I don't know if this is what you're referring to, but funny story: the fans had all these ideas about Holmes, okay, and they were writing fanfiction, and Doyle responded by killing the character off. So like. The fans got the opposite of what they wanted.

And that's how most creators respond. It's hard for me to see a "chilling effect" there.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 12:11 PM on May 27, 2016 [2 favorites]


> "And audience feedback into serial franchises has been a thing since Sherlock Holmes."

Since Alexandre Dumas at the very least.

(Somewhat similar story to Doyle. Dumas killed off the main character in the middle of a serial, leaving the entire plot unresolved -- I think to get out of a contract, if I'm remembering it right. He ignored his publisher's outrage that he had left the story unfinished, saying that sometimes life is like that, with not everything wrapped up neatly, and as the author he could end the story whenever he felt like, so there. He proved more responsive to the argument that all France desperately craved a resolution, saying that he was never one to ignore the demands of all France, so he resurrected the character and continued.)
posted by kyrademon at 1:42 PM on May 27, 2016 [4 favorites]


LGBTQ representation in American feature animation is at the point where people are wondering if this is Pixar's first lesbian couple.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 2:48 PM on May 27, 2016


I absolutely refuse to see a Ghostbusters remake unless they replace Slimer with a gorilla. I mean, otherwise it wouldn't be authentic and it would disrespect the original sacred concept of the creators and my three year old self that preferred the Filmation's Ghostbusters to The Real Ghostbusters would be just too offended to enjoy it.
posted by branravenraven at 7:12 PM on May 27, 2016


Who the everloving fuck is doing this?

If you've been fortunate to not see any of that sort of reaction, I'm not going to go pointing it out to you.

twist my arm: as an example of what's wrong with fandom that fucking blows

Never said it was an example of what was wrong with fandom, just saying that James Bond can't just be recast with a woman or a black man as simply as people suggest - certainly not as easily as say Doctor Who.

But suggesting that a) fandom's just off having fun in their corner and b) there's never an insistent side to their 'requests' is pretty damned disingenuous considering the amount of scorn and presumption dripping from your comment.

Sure, fan influence was heavy on Doyle, to the point he resurrected Holmes after killing him off. How much he famously disliked feeling having to do that I think is a valid thing to remember.
posted by gadge emeritus at 7:16 PM on May 27, 2016


Karmakaze: Thank you. I missed "Frozen Fever" when it was first released, and it was exactly what I needed to watch this weekend during a day of family medical drama.

But dang, even in a 10-minute short about sisterhood there's two separate references to Anna's romantic relationship with Kristoff. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but can we stop pretending that Disney isn't giving fanservice in doing so?
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 8:44 AM on May 30, 2016




but... we all know what his taste in vodka is like, so...
posted by sparklemotion at 6:11 PM on May 30, 2016


His vodka is excellent, even if the packaging is typically eccentric.
posted by maxsparber at 9:01 PM on May 30, 2016 [2 favorites]


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