Obvious Things You 0nly Just Realised - 2020

[Sebastian Cobb]

Yep. I quite happily go for lower res ripped copies as it's less hassle than getting the DVDs out, I can watch them on the laptop or tablet as well as the telly, and I don't have to listen to the DVD player whirring away. Easier to scan forwards and backwards and to pick up where you left off, generally speaking. Besides the special features they were jammed with in the earlier days, DVDs aren't really an improvement on VHS.

In some ways, although the picture quality was better, I found too many people were slack cunts and couldn't handle them with care, not that they were that fragile. I've never had a VHS come back unplayable because I leant it to some cretin who didn't have enough respect to put it back in its box.

I very rarely bothered watching the extras on dvd's tbh. A lot of it was me being apathetic and lazy, but a lot of it was just lobbed on to pad things out. I think you've either got to be really interested in a specific film or specific director to be interested in a commentary for instance, unless it features Danny Dyer and a cokehead.

Although I do really like Rob Altman and there's a lot of additional stuff (including more than one documentary) on my Long Goodbye Bluray that I ought to watch. Will I though? Probably not.

[touchingcloth]

In some ways, although the picture quality was better, I found too many people were slack cunts and couldn't handle them with care, not that they were that fragile. I've never had a VHS come back unplayable because I leant it to some cretin who didn't have enough respect to put it back in its box.

I very rarely bothered watching the extras on dvd's tbh. A lot of it was me being apathetic and lazy, but a lot of it was just lobbed on to pad things out. I think you've either got to be really interested in a specific film or specific director to be interested in a commentary for instance, unless it features Danny Dyer and a cokehead.

Although I do really like Rob Altman and there's a lot of additional stuff (including more than one documentary) on my Long Goodbye Bluray that I ought to watch. Will I though? Probably not.

I've never had an unplayable DVD, apart from shite DVD-Rs people have ripped. The error correction seems pretty good on them, but I also hold them by the edges and don't really loan them. Or ask for them back after I loan them - a running joke with a friend of mine is that he will give me back the copy of Jam I leant him in 2004.

I watched extras pretty religiously for a time, but some of the first DVDs I owned were Red Dwarf, LotR and Star War, and they all had interesting and well-produced ones. I'll still go with behind the scenes and director/cast commentaries if they're decently produced.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I've never had an unplayable DVD, apart from shite DVD-Rs people have ripped. The error correction seems pretty good on them, but I also hold them by the edges and don't really loan them. Or ask for them back after I loan them - a running joke with a friend of mine is that he will give me back the copy of Jam I leant him in 2004.

I watched extras pretty religiously for a time, but some of the first DVDs I owned were Red Dwarf, LotR and Star War, and they all had interesting and well-produced ones. I'll still go with behind the scenes and director/cast commentaries if they're decently produced.

Yeah it's trivial to not ruin dvd's by not smearing your grubby mitts all over them and put them back in their cases, but if you don't do that, it's trivial to make them unplayable. I think they are less robust than cd's, but then you're cramming almost 7 times the data (on a single layer) into the same space, of course it's going to be less robust.

I believe blurays got an extra hardened layer to protect them because so many feckless idiots complained dvd's were fragile.

[Menu]

I find Netflix infinitely less annoying than having to wait ten minutes after putting a Blu-Ray in to watch the fucker

That's ok, you can get a drink or something. At least it doesn't ruin the end of EVERYTHING you watch.

[touchingcloth]

That's ok, you can get a drink or something. At least it doesn't ruin the end of EVERYTHING you watch.

Who's arsed about the end of films? Credits can get to fuck. Oh, was Michael Fassbender in it, was he? Piss off.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Yeah unless it means it's going to make me miss a post-credits scene I couldn't really give a shit, and you can select the thumbnailed credits to bring them back.

Actually the only time now I look at credits is tedious nerdery to figure out if it's shot on film or digital and then only in rare circumstances.

[touchingcloth]

Yeah unless it means it's going to make me miss a post-credits scene I couldn't really give a shit, and you can select the thumbnailed credits to bring them back.

Actually the only time now I look at credits is tedious nerdery to figure out if it's shot on film or digital and then only in rare circumstances.

Credits aren't really any good for finding out who the cast is. If I want to know who a particular actor is I'll google it while watching or head to IMDB after. Post-credit scenes are an exception, but no one besides Marvel is making decent use of them currently, and I'm never sure what the idea is with blooper reels over credits. Do the FX companies pay waive some of their fee if the credits feature Benedict Cumberbatch saying that his name is Doctors Trange?

[Sebastian Cobb]

Credits aren't really any good for finding out who the cast is. If I want to know who a particular actor is I'll google it while watching or head to IMDB after. Post-credit scenes are an exception, but no one besides Marvel is making decent use of them currently, and I'm never sure what the idea is with blooper reels over credits. Do the FX companies pay waive some of their fee if the credits feature Benedict Cumberbatch saying that his name is Doctors Trange?

Don't even need to google on prime video. Hit pause and it's got a 'who are these cunts on screen, what else was that one in?' feature.

[touchingcloth]

Don't even need to google on prime video. Hit pause and it's got a 'who are these cunts on screen?' feature.

Yep, but the remote is usually farther away than my phone. I'm more around while films are on than actually paying attention to them.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Yep, but the remote is usually farther away than my phone. I'm more around while films are on than actually paying attention to them.

If it's a film I care about I find I have to put my phone out of arms reach these days :(

[touchingcloth]

If it's a film I care about I find I have to put my phone out of arms reach these days :(

Same, but I'll end up pausing if not googling live. My attention span is

[Ptolemy Ptarmigan]

Downtown Abbey isn't like Cadfael or The Name of the Rose.

Whenever someone says Downtown Abbey, I say "'Tis!".

What?

"'Tis an abbey."

One day someone will get it and I'll know I've finally found a friend.

[Dex Sawash]

Don't even need to google on prime video. Hit pause and it's got a 'who are these cunts on screen, what else was that one in?' feature.

Fucking love that feature.

[Ptolemy Ptarmigan]

It's useful unless you're watching it with someone who has to know the name of everyone they vaguely recognise from somewhere else. Might as well go to bed because you're never going to get to the end of the film.

[Menu]

Who's arsed about the end of films? Credits can get to fuck. Oh, was Michael Fassbender in it, was he? Piss off.

It's more like if there's been an emotional or shocking ending just before the credits roll, having a big preview thing come up immediately really takes you out of the moment. I mean, if they waited say 30 seconds that would be better. It's the artistic vandalism of it. "Stop thinking about that programme now, you loser. WATCH A NEW ONE IMMEDIATELY!"

[touchingcloth]

It's more like if there's been an emotional or shocking ending just before the credits roll, having a big preview thing come up immediately really takes you out of the moment. I mean, if they waited say 30 seconds that would be better. It's the artistic vandalism of it. "Stop thinking about that programme now, you loser. WATCH A NEW ONE IMMEDIATELY!"

That's fair. Or the thing some programmes do, of self-sabotaging the programme itself by leaking things in the opening credits. Staged which came out recently had a final episode which kept teasing that a big name in British theatre was going to show up, but the opening credits had quite prominently displayed Judi Dench's name so any sense of surprise was ruined.

[Sebastian Cobb]

That's fair. Or the thing some programmes do, of self-sabotaging the programme itself by leaking things in the opening credits. Staged which came out recently had a final episode which kept teasing that a big name in British theatre was going to show up, but the opening credits had quite prominently displayed Judi Dench's name so any sense of surprise was ruined.

That could be down to those baffling rules where people can get paid more depending on how they're displayed during the opening credits, I think buzby's explained it before but things like shoving 'and' in front of their name or saying what character they are ('Danny DeVito as "Frank Reynolds"') can result in more money or something.

[mjwilson]

That's fair. Or the thing some programmes do, of self-sabotaging the programme itself by leaking things in the opening credits. Staged which came out recently had a final episode which kept teasing that a big name in British theatre was going to show up, but the opening credits had quite prominently displayed Judi Dench's name so any sense of surprise was ruined.

Anthony Stewart Head the star here, for appearing unannounced at the end of a Buffy episode and forgoing his credit.

[touchingcloth]

That could be down to those baffling rules where people can get paid more depending on how they're displayed during the opening credits, I think buzby's explained it before but things like shoving 'and' in front of their name or saying what character they are ('Danny DeVito as "Frank Reynolds"') can result in more money or something.

Ah, I didn't realise that thing was related to pay, other than that it correlates by actors who can command a big fee also tend to demand an "and..." credit, but the two things being negotiated separately.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Ah, I didn't realise that thing was related to pay, other than that it correlates by actors who can command a big fee also tend to demand an "and..." credit, but the two things being negotiated separately.

I think I may be wrong and what you're saying is closer to the truth looking at this:
https://www.quora.com/Why-are-some-actors-credited-as-with-name-or-and-name-at-the-end-of-a-cast-credit-sequence-when-they-are-one-of-the-prominent-leads

It seems to be more about fragile egos. I'm not sure how a genuinely good actor confident of their skills could go about asking for their name to appear very slightly longer than someone else's without feeling incredibly petty.

Although I guess building this sense of prestige does feed back in how much you can demand on future roles.

[touchingcloth]

I think I may be wrong and what you're saying is closer to the truth looking at this:
https://www.quora.com/Why-are-some-actors-credited-as-with-name-or-and-name-at-the-end-of-a-cast-credit-sequence-when-they-are-one-of-the-prominent-leads

It seems to be more about fragile egos. I'm not sure how a genuinely good actor confident of their skills could go about asking for their name to appear very slightly longer than someone else's without feeling incredibly petty.

Although I guess building this sense of prestige does feed back in how much you can demand on future roles.

I think the reality is they don't ask, their agents do it instead. They'll be massaging of egos going on: "Judi, darling, an actor of your class simply must have an 'and' credit." It'll be part of the cult of celebrity which leads to people having riders specifying only brown M&Ms, possibly without the star the star never having asked for that explicitly themselves, and possibly without there ever being a single moment where they notice they've crossed the line to being a high maintenance diva sort.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Yeah true, apparently in the 90's back when the Simpsons had celebrities on to skewer rather than just be sycophantic to, they'd regularly get stars asking 'why haven't you had me on' and they'd say 'we tried but your agent knocked it back'.

[beanheadmcginty]

It'll be part of the cult of celebrity which leads to people having riders specifying only brown M&Ms,

*Mourning Eddie Van Halen fans leave the thread, muttering "don't you people ever pay attention?"*

[kalowski]

*Mourning Eddie Van Halen fans leave the thread, muttering "don't you people ever pay attention?"*

Yeah. I'd assumed everyone knew the reason behind the brown M & Ms by now.

[touchingcloth]

Yeah. I'd assumed everyone knew the reason behind the brown M & Ms by now.

It's just a Wayne's World reference to me. Though that said I have a dim memory of something being used as a check whether the other outlandish rider requests were likely to have been complied with, so that if there were brown M&Ms they would know not to be  hopeful that the body temperature Dom Perignon and platter of swan gizzards would be waiting.

[beanheadmcginty]

It's potentially worth looking up if you get the chance.

[touchingcloth]

U-boats couldn't stay submerged for long or communicate by radio with each other without surfacing, so effective tactics to defeat them were developed and they weren't the silent, sneaky menaces of the deep I had assumed.

[kalowski]

It's just a Wayne's World reference to me. Though that said I have a dim memory of something being used as a check whether the other outlandish rider requests were likely to have been complied with, so that if there were brown M&Ms they would know not to be  hopeful that the body temperature Dom Perignon and platter of swan gizzards would be waiting.

Yes, except it was the additional safety requirements regarding their rig.

"Van Halen was the first to take 850 par lamp lights — huge lights — around the country," Roth said. "At the time, it was the biggest production ever." In many cases, the venues were too outdated or inadequately prepared to set up the band's sophisticated stage.
"If I came backstage, having been one of the architects of this lighting and staging design, and I saw brown M&Ms on the catering table, then I guarantee the promoter had not read the contract rider, and we would have to do a serious line check" of the entire stage setup, Roth said.

[touchingcloth]

Yes, except it was the additional safety requirements regarding their rig.

It seems an odd safety check to do. What if that's the only part of the rider they read? I don't reckon "the sweets were the right colour, so I didn't check everything was safe" would get the tour manager out of the industrial manslaughter hearing. It's almost like the explanation was retrofitted.

[kalowski]

It seems an odd safety check to do. What if that's the only part of the rider they read? I don't reckon "the sweets were the right colour, so I didn't check everything was safe" would get the tour manager out of the industrial manslaughter hearing. It's almost like the explanation was retrofitted.

I don't imagine it was the only check, just a broad and fun one.