QuickTidal, on 18 October 2012 - 01:00 PM, said:
It's not a defense sir. Cause has every reason to dislike the show. Absolutely his opinion. I'm not asking him to like the show. I'm saying that TV is RARELY realistic in MANY ways (not just science)...but science always get's brought into it.
I'd have loved to have heard his thoughts on the character development, the actors themselves, or hell the narrative itself...but all we got was "the physics is no good". And that felt like a copout comment. Tell us the other stuff that made it so "average". That's all I'm asking for here. He's welcome to watch what he likes. Does an unrealistic fight dismiss the entire show? I don't think it does. So what else doesn't he like about it?
Perhaps that was just the most stand-out, easily identified aspect for him to mention? "I didn't like this show. And that fight was totally unrealistic too, I hate that..." is a perfectly valid criticism. It is, after all, a recurring PROBLEM with TV shows. If directors were paying attention, mayhap we'd have less blatant disregard for physics in the name of "the audience will like this because it's over the top/unrealistic!" and we'd like some shows a lot more? The fact that it keeps getting brought up - and you KNOW it does - is a big wake-up call, not a thing to be treated with disregard. As I said - it's all about Willing Suspension of Disbelief; perhaps people can take everything else, but this sticks? If so: CHANGE IT. Don't just keep doing what you're doing because you think it SHOULD be what the audience wants. Right?
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Cause's comment assuming/implying that the director/producers don't know about physics, having directors as friends in the industry, that rubbed me the wrong way. Of course they do. It's not like they have a meeting and decide to ignore it. They just think it would LOOK cooler the way they did it.
I see what you are saying Silencer, but to be honest, if anyone went into REVOLUTION expecting realism, then they were clearly barking up the wrong tree. It's a show where someone has managed to SWITCH OFF ELECTRICITY in everything but our bodies. Realism is not its bread and butter.
And there is very LITTLE TV that is grounded in any kind of realism. VERY little. In fact, a lot of the unbelievable stuff (things they get up to on Grey's Anatomy medically, on any cop show when the lead gets in trouble and isn't fired but has his badge suspended/taken, the CSI shows portraying investigators as wizards with futuristic tech) gets glossed over by folk BECAUSE it's not physics or science which is so easy to get upset over apparently.
Seriously, look up the majority of complaints people have with shows and movies of this genre and the thing that people always love to rip on is physics and science.
Again, all this just points out that, maybe, just maybe, directors should LISTEN to their fans? "Did not do the research" is, in most people's books, a chronic fail. The thing is, it's fine when most of the viewership are not informed on the subject themselves. It doesn't detract for them. But when they ARE, it is blatant and the producers are caught out. Hell, to some, it may feel like they're being treated like "Viewers are Morons". And especially in this day and age, where things like the impact of a bullet on a human body has been thoroughly proven and shown to NOT be like they just got hit with a canon ball, people will NOTICE.
As for it being a show based on an "unrealistic" premise, or rather, having some supernatural/magitek/magic/alien tech device in it...irrelevant. "Like Reality Unless Noted". Hell, it's the reason we even bother setting shows in places that look like earth today/in ten years. Everything works AS NORMAL except where it is explicitly noted that due to the premise/main plot it doesn't. That doesn't excuse ALL physics (that we "want to look cooler") blunders. Why do people still walk on the ground? THAT part of physics works normally. Why don't we have laser guns? That's as normal. But - even though it has
nothing to do with the main plot and its electricity cancelling stuff, we'll fuck with the way people react when shot. Screw that part of physics. HELLO. It's not plot-relevant, it's a glaring piece of unrealism, which hurts many people's suspension of disbelief.
Say it with me. LIKE REALITY UNLESS NOTED. Or should that be, "unless plot-relevant"? Either way, those other shows you list, they have REASONS for doing what they do. It's to keep the plot moving. Does that excuse them? Not in my eyes, for the most part, actually. In fact, I don't like any of those shows for those exact reasons you list! (Amongst other reasons)But still, those shows have an excuse for giving the CSI team the Magical Database of Everything, and ludicrously accurate forensics. Hell, if you want to contend that the plot-related reason for giving them those things is so that it's interesting (i.e. they actually catch the villain and it doesn't take ten years to do so), fine - I even tend to agree that the basic premise of the show is unrealistic. But NEWSFLASH, someone getting shot realistically is INTERESTING in and of itself! It doesn't need to be turned into cartoon violence that makes it laughable to be entertaining! For me, that makes it WORSE!
And besides which, people are quite within their rights to dislike a show purely because of what it does to physics. Some people like Hard sci-fi. Some people don't mind if it's softer. Some people LIKE softer. Some people like both in different ways at different times. But you can still decide to like a show based on those things; because they affect your enjoyment of all the good scenes. All the space-battles, all the drama outside the ship. It's a perfectly valid criticism. Sure, you may be missing out on other things, but I think if Cause had really liked the characters/plot/etc he wouldn't have judged it solely on the fight scenes. It's not a big enough part of this show (unlike the mechanics of space in a sci-fi show) to make or break it on its own (unless it was REALLY bad). It's just that he chose to mention those as being particularly bad.
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No one ever complains that everyone on TV....EVERYONE ON TV gets up in the morning in full makeup and looks like a demi god or goddess. Seriously, no one ever complains about that. So we let something like that slide, but if a guy gets thrown back too far when shot or swiped with a sword it's an automatic fail?
Actually, people do. I do. My parents do. I have friends who do. Especially female friends.
There's even a Trope about it. BUT, while that might be a problem people have with the show, why do we let it slide? It's not that glaring. It's easy to overlook. It's not the centrepiece of a grand action scene (though, again, I do have friends who complain when a heroine walks out of a "tough fight" looking like she's just come out of the limo and onto the red carpet....or even when they just don't look realistically beaten up AT ALL - it was a huge appeal of Bruce Willis back when Die Hard came out that he actually got beaten up, wasn't it?
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It's easier to suspend disbelief over this. It isn't glaringly obviously WRONG. But hey, 80s action movies were accepted back in the day. People still like them, for their charm factor. Perhaps in another decade, the instant-makeup in the morning syndrome will disappear? With HD on the rise, it's getting harder and harder to sell actors and actresses as inhumanly perfect, after all. Poor newsreaders...XD
So, you're wrong, people do complain. And moreover, it's still not something on the same scale as violating the fundamental laws of physics which govern our lives. As long as that is kept within the bounds of the show, however, that is also fine.
Think about LOST. Lots of weird shit happened on the Island. But if someone back on the mainland had been seen, I dunno, walking around carrying a tank above his head with one arm, it would have been stand-out enough to get people complaining (more likely, wondering, given the nature of LOST, but you get my point). It's the stretching point. How far can you bend the rules before people complain? Today, it's a lot less far when it comes to physics than it used to be. People are more informed of that now. People care about it more now. Especially in a show that is modern-day earth (or, more rightly, Twenty Minutes Into the Future/After the End) and therefore by default Like Reality Unless Noted...people care.
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And I don't LOVE the show...I'm still quite on the fence about it. But I'm not going to let the handwaved science get in the way of my enjoyment of it.
And Cause, I'm sorry if my comment came off as "dickish" as my friend Silencer calls me (
) I meant it to be more of a "what are you on about, this show is swashbuckling forget the science TV" and probably was poorly worded because I just woke up...but I would TRULY like to hear about the other stuff you didn't like about it. I'm interested in how people perceive the show.
Oh and lastly: Silencer...you realize that Eric Kripke's (the CREATOR of the CW as a channel)claim to fame is SUPERNATURAL. A show that frequently goes way above and beyond the science and physics to tell great stories. So no, I can't really see anyone going into REV with the thoughts that because it's Kripke it would be more "believable". He's never gone for that feature in his shows.
Supernatural's central premise is "All Myths Are True" and features two guys who hunt monsters for a living. Therefore, any physics violated by supernatural powers is forgiven. THAT is fine. However, in general, the cars and guns still function mostly as real, do they not? And being a fairly self-aware show, they tended to lampshade the fact that they were being silly with something when they DID mess around with things. So actually, I do kinda expect Kripke to keep things on a nice leash. Fun, but only where the plot allows/with a nice big lampshade on it. That's the Kripke I know. *shrug* Though, again, I'm arguing this one blind, in a general sense, not having actually seen the show in question. XD
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