...and with that, you've not only brought back this thread, but also stirred within me the original inspiration I felt to start that other 'lost' thread, asking if anybody's movie-viewing habits have changed lately... and, thereby, also stirred my compulsion to explain the Giant Stupid Theory Of What Might Be Goin' On With Movies which originally inspired me to post that thread, but which I then never got around to explaining, despite false starts.

So I'm gonna take another few swings at that.

In the meantime, fuck yes. Fuck fuck fuck yes.

Heh — it's definitely a "Teague loosely outlines his thoughts beforehand and then just rants into camera" thing.

But your disappointment fuels me, so that's nice.

I feel ashamed and unfueled.

Yeah, that has horrified me as well. For it to work, they'll have to make a really good joke of this concept in the movie itself (they'll probably try, after all it's Deadpool).

I made a joke to my buddy years ago that they were going to put out the movie and then the reboot of that movie after 6 months.   we're on our way.

but at least then we'll get some sort of super meta take on that about a movie that is rebooted within that very movie...some sort of movie singularity.

My violent agreement with your point pushed me out of my procrastination, so, fine: here's some dumb-ass shit.

Thoughts tomorrow, but for now: Holy god those last ten minutes are some horrifying shit, Chrystie.

You on a quest to become a Moby lookalike, Chrystie?

Also, what you said. All the fuck thumbs over here.

Holy shit, Teague.

I've had a few similar thoughts myself, but never really connected the dots and looked at it this way. I have a feeling I'm gonna be mulling over a lot of what you've said for quite some time

(btw this really made me realise how much I miss the podcast)

Phyew. I was half-convinced I'd just lost my mind, so I'm glad you guys are digging it.

Art optimization seems to be present in every aspect of entertainment and I definitely feel the fatigue. In the movie world, I used to enjoy superhero movies in the early 2000's. The genre at the time wasn't new, but studios hadn't systematically gotten those movies down to a cold formula. And so things still felt fresh. Now I feel the fatigue of similar types of "charming" characters, similar pacing, similar editing, and similar color grading.

I bet no one here watches the show Survivor (that show is still on?), but I've been watching for nearly two decades. I still enjoy the show but even a reality show is not immune to optimization. There are certain elements of the game that have evolved seemingly to keep the audience more superficially entertained. There was a hidden immunity idol that made for a thrilling moment last season? Let's put in more of them! Let's throw in multiple hidden advantages! Let's swap the tribes multiple times! Let's do everything we can to create surface-level excitement at the expense of conveying a real and genuine experience. I still enjoy the show though because the social dynamics are fascinating enough despite the "optimized" nature of everything else.

This is even true of movie documentaries. Remember "The Beginning", a documentary on the DVD of The Phantom Menace? It was so raw and so fresh. Then, as the prequel movies went on, these documentaries became edited with more and more intention. By the time we got to The Force Awakens, one might get the feeling that everything was great & everybody got along fantastically while making that movie (even though we know that's not the case). Although here, the optimization is not so much about the dopamine, but rather about the most efficient way to use the documentaries as propaganda.

Hell, even YouTube is not immune to this. The most successful YouTubers nowadays have gotten things down to a formula. They'll be talking to the camera with quick cuts as they move from topic to topic. They'll have someone off camera that they have "banter" with to give the appearance of authenticity. They'll insert multiple "calls to action" in their videos (remember to subscribe......hit that subscribe button......rate, comment, and subscribe if you like this video....etc.).

In general, things seem much more fresh and natural when they're just starting out. But it doesn't take long before companies or creators start to embark on that path of "optimization". It's not always bad though. But past a certain threshold (which is different from person to person), it becomes noticeable, tiring, and......unappealing.

Personally, I'm not all that knowledgeable about music theory or music history, so some parts of that got a little confusing for me. But the main point was still very fascinating. I think he might need to get an editor to tighten up his videos to allow for better audience retention in the future......I kid! Un-optimized Teague is lots of fun to listen to haha. (It sort of reminds me of when everyone used to talk over each other on the early DIF commentaries. It felt so real and raw! Then it became more optimized over time as they realized how things are "supposed to be". There's no escaping optimization. Even when it's not an intentionally calculated move, it still ends up happening.)

RE: Big-studio-movie. Same thing with big-studio-video games. Though I don't know how much that's due to optimization (this year's Call of Duty didn't have single player, but it did have a battle royale mode!) and budgets just getting untenable. Shamus Young made a point when talking about the evolution of Bioware (in the context of the Mass Effect series) that the early 2000s seemed to be a good mix of creators able to make art with the time and money needed to do so vs. huge teams needing to be able to have the latest graphics and physics, all with aggressive deadlines and budgets. As a result, I haven't been interested in any AAA titles this year, but I keep playing stuff by indie developers (Bendy and the Ink Machine) and midsize developers (American Truck Sim, Stellaris) that don't have conglomerate publishers - the studios, by way of comparison - holding things (optimization?) over them.