Downtown Khazan: Ice Cold Utopia

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

I think that anyone who treats Evangelion like that should probably take a step back and have a good think.

[Nik Hasta]

Whenever I think I have a read on where Dandadan is going, it gives me a glorious and beautiful swerve.

This series is really quite excellent. One of the most consistently good things running right now.

[Nik Hasta]

Well, it's looking increasingly that the UK might end up with it's third Prime Minister in a single calendar year.

Absolute scenes.

[Postmania]

Well, it's looking increasingly that the UK might end up with it's third Prime Minister in a single calendar year.

Absolute scenes.

??? Didn't you just have the Truss bridge come in

[Cleric of Hell’s Brigade]

Well, it's looking increasingly that the UK might end up with it's third Prime Minister in a single calendar year.

Absolute scenes.

Umm, what? I thought you just got another one after May?

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

She did something rather stupid in an attempt to aid the economy, and now it's blowing up in her face. From what I understand her party is rapidly losing confidence in her ability to do anything intelligent.

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Umm, what? I thought you just got another one after May?

Boris Johnson was the PM after May, he did such a terrible job they fired him, and replaced him with Liz Truss. Who is... doing about as poorly, but at a pretty pivotal point in time, making it much worse... I think?

[Postmania]

I just wasn’t aware that you could have public office revolve like that. It’s the year of 4 emperors all over again or something

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

I just wasn’t aware that you could have public office revolve like that. It’s the year of 4 emperors all over again or something

something something don't learn history, blah blah repeat it.

Also you know, Brexit broke a lotta brains. They got what they wanted, but didn't plan past it.

[Cleric of Hell’s Brigade]

Boris Johnson was the PM after May, he did such a terrible job they fired him, and replaced him with Liz Truss. Who is... doing about as poorly, but at a pretty pivotal point in time, making it much worse... I think?

Sorry, yeah, I meant Johnson, not May.

Still, that’s sounds……unfortunate.

[Crunkula]

I dunno, the MD of MD Geist stands for "Most Dangerous", denoting that he is one of - if not indeed the upper echelon of - the Most Dangerous genetically engineered super soldiers of his generation.

I feel BitVyper's broader point was that it would take a certain personality type to actually enjoy the whole 'get in the robot' scenario that Amuro and later Shinji find themselves in and it wouldn't be kids that are forcefully drafted into a war against mechs or monsters, it'd be someone who's a bit of an unhinged edgelord.

Mobile Suit Gundam and Evangelion aren't really about "get robot, get bitches." If they were, we'd have completely different shows with a different sort of lead.

Fair enough.

But with Amuro, he eventually grew to become a warrior after constant battles with the Gundam. So, he kinda did have a character arc (With great personal tragedy along the way) Shinji was just a kid fucked by destiny and his father who saw him as nothing more than a war weapon. The show proper and the "End of Evangelion" movie did nothing to change that, doubling down on his misery and his already fragile psyche being shattered into tiny bits. I hear it's different for him in the manga, and the new rebuild movies, but I haven't seen them yet.

[BitVyper]

Man, I don't think Geist was particularly dumb or smart. I just think it had some interesting bits with rough edges that did a lot to show why rough edges are good, and the director's perspective was interesting. The Director's cut did a lot to improve the first one too. It's not without nuance or cool symbolism, but it doesn't get a lot of chance to explore those things either. It gets close to examining some of its themes but never quite gets there, which is something I find thought provoking in a way. Like a more thorough examination of MD Krauser would probably land the guy firmly in either egomaniacal villain territory or misunderstood tragic hero, but it doesn't really get there and that leaves a lot of questions to ask in a way that modern media doesn't a lot of the time. It's really a story that's just a story, and it's very unapologetic, and I like those things. Also the soundtrack, especially for Death Force, is spectacular. Honest to god, Death Force has one of my favourite songs period in it:



Anyway, my point was just that it's neat that if you listen to the commentary, you'd expect a smugly written edgelordy anti-Amuro, but what the show actually delivers is a real anti-Amuro, and it's very cognizant that he's a total maniac.

I got this film on DVD from a pound shop like ten years ago

Going after the price is a low blow. It was a first time director with zero prestige making something totally new that only got one episode and then one more episode ten years later, all bundled up in a batch of things that were clearly just the studio rolling a ton of dice. It was obviously never going to be anything expensive.

[Nik Hasta]

Boris Johnson was the PM after May, he did such a terrible job they fired him, and replaced him with Liz Truss. Who is... doing about as poorly, but at a pretty pivotal point in time, making it much worse... I think?

Johnson was less incompetent as he was just incredibly corrupt. Highlights of his premiership include but are not limited to; allowing an epic amount of corruption over government covid contracts, doing some crimes by breaking laws he himself had instated, attempting to protect and promote a couple of sex offenders within parliament, lying constantly, having three ethics ministers resign on him in protest and other such fun things.

Despite all this Johnson was somewhat successful as he was using populist rhetoric about levelling up deprived areas of the country which outflanked Labour to the left on the economy, though the new department for levelling up is pretty inefficient, and he was somewhat charismatic to a certain section of the population. So he got by for a while without his party turning on him.

Truss appears to be worse in that she's a hard right economic ideologue with no ideas and no charisma. During the leadership election in the Tory party, much hay was made of her economic plan with pundits saying "Well, she's saying she's going to do this but once she's in office, she'll have to face reality and make a different choice,"

Alas, she did not. The main thing is that her economic plan is in the process of crashing our economy with the pound being the lowest it's ever been at since the invention of the dollar and our economy shrinking by 3% in less than a week.

This Twitter thread is a more full accounting of what the last seven days have been like.

So things are pretty bad.

I just wasn’t aware that you could have public office revolve like that. It’s the year of 4 emperors all over again or something

The last three Tory Prime Ministers have all resigned rather than been voted out. We have had two elections 2017 and 2019 in that period which the Tories won both times.

Truss is falling apart in record time though, that's the unprecedented bit. The difference between her and Johnson is that her party really hate her and they liked Johnson.

[Nik Hasta]

Going after the price is a low blow. It was a first time director with zero prestige making something totally new that only got one episode and then one more episode ten years later, all bundled up in a batch of things that were clearly just the studio rolling a ton of dice. It was obviously never going to be anything expensive.

My comment wasn't that the price point reflected the quality of the film, I have bought cheap DVDs of lots of good films over the years. MD Geist isn't one of them but I don't think the price you pay for a piece of media really factors into its quality.

My point was more that I came across this weird DVD very much by chance, having never heard of it before nor heard of anyone else who had seen it since. Because of that context, it's surprising for me to encounter two people who have not only seen it but even like it.

[Nik Hasta]

Ah, in serendipitous happenstance, band I like Martha have just put out a song that sums up my feelings about the country and the moment we're living through.



It's also a banger.