It is definitely not a grammatical issue, but it a good rule of thumb for writing, particularly academic writing. One of the first things that was drilled into me as an English major was to drop, “very,” and find a better adjective.

Also, yeah, a lot of these are very poor matches, especially without context, but one of my favorite things about the English language is that it is a very large, redundant language, but none of our words have the exact same connotation. Big, large, huge, enormous, gigantic, tremendous, mammoth, gargantuan, and humongous are all technically synonyms, but all conjure different images in the reader.

But yeah, telling someone to say, “fragile,” instead of, “very weak,” is dumb, given they could mean, “delicate,” or, “feeble.” And if you’re not writing a term paper, just say, “very.”

That makes sense. I know he didn’t write the movie, but I assumed that he had a lot of input on the monster design. He always has a lot of input on the monster design.

Honestly, I remember similar vamp lore dragging down the first one. There some interesting stuff with Frost being lower class because he was turned Vamp instead of born Vamp, but the third-act vampire-god thing was kinda meh, ending with some horribly dated CGI.

Also, while the world building was cool, it’s not as though Blade is a super interesting character. He’s a super cool bad-ass, but I find myself checking out when they get into his emotional backstory. Whistler id mich more of the emotional core of fhat movie, which is probably why they had to bring him back in the second (which ie something in fhe second movie that I thought was a cheap cop-out).

Yeah, I thought that was the general consensus too, but I couldn’t be sure that wasn’t just an echo chamber I’d created with my friend group.

I actually thought 4 was better than 2 and 3. Not that 4 was very good, but I thought 2 and 3 suffered from an attempt to, “trilogize,” the series and make it a grand epic. It was clear by the end of the third movie that they didn’t know where they were going with all of the plot threads they’d set up like Calypso, the Brethren Court, the Jack/Elizabeth/Will love triangle they were hinting at…just way to many ideas and very little payoff. At least 4 told a coherent story in one movie, even if it wasn’t a very good story.

I would argue that Blade II is the better movie. Guillermo del Toro is a much more interesting director, and the Reapers are basically a dry run for his take on Vampires in The Strain.

Well, as long as you have a plan.

How will you know when you’re being bombed?

You might be able to get the point of the show across in 30 seconds, but it’s hard to set the vibe. Think about how much atmosphere Batman: TAS built in the minute-plus intro. Besides, it’s not like that time is going towards the episode length; TV shows have gone from 24 minutes in the late 80s/early 90s to 21 minutes in the 2000s, and all that extra time went to commercials. It would be nice if they could at least give 30 seconds back towards a good theme song.

These answers are a testament to how much better theme songs were before the 2000s, especially for kids shows. You used to get a minute and a half of hype music to introduce new viewers to the show or psych up returning viewers. Now, even the best ones, like Gravity Falls, are less then 40 seconds.

This is probably the correct answer. I don’t particularly like or dislike Cheers, and it went off the air when I was five, but even as a child, that theme song gave me a deep, nostalgic yearning for something I cannot articulate.

The extended version is a fucking banger. Guy makes duck sounds with his guitar. Hendrix might have been able to make a guitar sing, but I never heard him make it quack.

Can’t tell if the title typo is an intentional joke or your autocorrect’s, “learned words,” are telling on you.

Well, Boston Dynamics has some pretty incredible robot dogs, but they’re probably going to use them on us if we ever demand a living wage or Medicare for All, so we’re still screwed.

Blond Jesus has a way more toxic following than Historically Accurate Jesus.

Yeah, don’t mistake my criticism of armchair leftists for all leftists. I certainly fall pretty far on the communist/socialist spectrum compared to what passes for the American left. But at this point, I have more respect for normie liberals who are just getting radicalized enough to take action, even if the action is just supporting a more progressive primary candidate, over online leftists who just mock them and argue theory.

I agree that you shouldn’t rely on elections alone, and mutual aid/community organizing are a huge part of any resistance to authoritarianism. I’m mostly criticizing leftists who claim (or at least imply) that violence is the only possible resistance to a authoritarians.

I really believe that we are capable of turning back the tide of authoritarianism through the levers of democracy. When South Korean politicians scaled the fence around Parliament to vote down martial law, I fully expected the President and military to ignore them, but it worked for them, and it could work for us. If we continue to excise weak-willed centrists from the Democratic party and show Republicans that authoritarian rule will not be tolerated (as the people of Minnesota did), I really believe we can dismantle American fascism with our current institutions. (Dismantling the oligarchy and strengthening those institutions will be a longer, harder battle, but I think clearing out the current fascist regime is well within our immediate grasp.)

Agreed. Until there is an open Civil War, voting will be important, as well as protests and general strikes.

Well, first of all, no I’m not just talking about America. There are tons of leftists on here who argue that voting is hopeless any time an authoritarian rises to power, and seem to believe the only solution is a violent revolution that they are not planning (not that I’m trying to bait anyone or fed-posting, but I doubt the people spending 16 hours a day debating Neo-Marxism versus Anarchist Communism are also forming a militia).

Second of all, you’re saying that the American system is set up to prevent voting out fascism, but what you’re describing is learned helplessness, not institutional restrictions. Learned helplessness is powerful, but I’m rapidly seeing it being unlearned since Trump took office. Republicans who’ve been ignoring economic issues for identity politics suddenly seem sick of hearing about wokeness. Liberal wine moms who held up, “But her emails,” signs in 2017 want Chuck Schumer’s blood. The other day I saw the fucking Mueller She Wrote account slamming Dick Durbin for saying, “reform,” ICE instead, “abolish.”

In terms of the institutions, there are a lot of measures against direct democracy that make reforms more difficult, but the structure of our elections have huge advantages. The constitution gives power of our federal elections squarely with the states, which is why Trump is having so much trouble rigging the elections. His current plan seems to be, “send ICE to intimidate voters,” and based on Minneapolis, that’s not an effective strategy.

Even the bigger obstacles are mostly imaginary. Congressional gridlock can easily be overcome by leadership willing to abolish the filibuster. Supreme Court members can be impeached, and the Court can be expanded by Congress. There are institutional, Democratic solutions to this, we just have to stop pretending they’re too difficult.

True, and I don’t mean to imply that Hungary will magically be transformed into a thriving democracy as soon as Orbàn is out. It’s gonna take years to rebuild the judiciary alone, and we’ll see how committed Maygar is to restoring inconvenient aspects of democracy like press freedom and fair elections. Still, Hungary took the first step towards reestablishing democracy by voting, and I’m getting tired of hearing how voting doesn’t work from people who’s only political activities are sharing the, “You’re Finished,” meme and telling people to read theory.