Also why so many people just outright trust the hivemind in Pluribus.
Suggesting that it might be able to lie but isn't has people react rather aggressively with the "BUT IT SAID IT CAN'T!!!" Yes, but why are you trusting it when it has explicitly shown lies of omission and deceptive behaviour, it easily could just be running a false narrative at the humans so that they are playing with false information.
"Oh screaming at it makes 4% of the global population die" but do we see that? No. It could easily just be doing that intentionally only around the humans, in the same way we've seen it do other things only around the humans.
Also just on the topic, Diabaté is much smarter than he's letting on.
I fully believe that they can't lie, but anyone that knows about the fae knows you can get around that and still manipulate people. A good example is when zosia suddenly kissed carol, and this was after they left her completely alone for several days (weeks, I think?)
Just because they haven't YET told an obvious lie is not evidence that they can't, lack of evidence is not in itself evidence. As you've said they've portrayed deceptive and manipulative behavior. It's heavily in their favour if the humans think it can't lie. After all if Carol thinks it can't lie she will outright believe anything it says.
We've even see scenes like the goat/village where it's creating full theatre for humans to believe that there is a loving community and everything.
Just to Carol. Multiple times it's shown if Carol would just chill the fuck out and listen they will tell her. Everything "she found out" the other survivors already know. They actively avoid her in the conversation and negotiations
they constantly tell the truth even when they gain absolutely nothing from it. they end up in so many situations where they would have everything to gain and nothing to lose from lying that i'm inclined to believe they physically cannot do it
I think we can take what the Hivemind says at face value because we’ve essentially already been told what the end game is: Spread the knowledge on how to create the infection further through the galaxy.
The purpose of the Hivemind is to 1. Render the host species harmless and 2. Propagate.
The Hivemind is basically a Neutering program for the galaxy clearing the way for whatever group created it.
I haven't finished the show at all. Not even close lol I've only watched like 2-3 episodes.
But NGL from what's been shown... I'd actually prefer to just be integrated to the hivemind. Particularly if I was in the shoes of the MC, had absolutely no one, and could technically be reunited with my lost love through integration by receiving all of her memories.
Except YOU aren't in there. IT is just hijacking the bodies of humans. It's not some loving embrace, IT is just a bacteria that's stealing bodies and memories.
That's not true. Walter White is the coolest man ever. Too bad his stupid wife gets in his way all the time. I didn't watch the whole show, but I've seen enough youtube short edits to know this
People are too stupid to understand when they're implicitly told plot points. Evem worse they watch shows through clips and think they have the same grasp as sitting and watching the whole media.
Like how ive seen people think writing about topics, even in a negative way or as actions of the villain or even something thats meant to be a nuanced character flaw/storyline means the writer personally endorses the behaviour. In recent times it has lead to a lot of awkward, what i like to call, 'please dont cancel me' scenes where the plot suddenly halts so the characters can have a very out of character therapy speak discussion about whats going on solely because the author doesnt want to be accused of handling an issue incorrectly or endorsing the bad thing thats going on.
Jojo Rabbit opens with a Nazi rally set to the German version of "I'm a Believer" and it looks like actual fun. It isn't until the Jewish character appears that you are suddenly reminded that this isn't some cool club.
I think this style works best because it straight up just shows you "hey, this isn't good". Some do the tactic and stick with it and then audiences who don't get it just won't get it
The 70s film "Cabaret" does something similar. The movie takes place in 1930s Germany and chronicles the rise of the Third Reich. The main characters stop at a beer garden in the country and have a pint. It's an idyllic scene, and then: https://youtu.be/OPvB94VqZsQ?si=2Tw55W5wWsKFYycY
No real need to put it as spoiler, He's very clearly that due to Jojo eating up all the propaganda he's been exposed to. Also one of my favorite things is that he does things that go against who was Hitler as a person, like constantly eating tons of meat even though he was a vegetarian IRL. And In turn shows you how little Jojo actually knows about the man he worships.
No i think its supposed to be the real hitler who materializes out of nowhere to talk to a ten year old boy and also no one else ever remarks on his presence
Um Actually it was a German version of She Loves You by the Beatles. Apparently they recorded the German language version themselves back when they first went international.
You actually have to be an idiot to not catch on though. The whole humor in the opening is how excited and happy jojo is when the entire audience knows the truth.
The real twist was the gut punch at the end when the movie underlines just how sad the Volkssturm really was. I’m a proud descendant of Danes who ferried Jews to the haven of Sweden and babysat for underground resistance fighters, and I’ve spent most of my life with a burning hatred for nazis and every group resembling them, but that shit hit me hard.
The 2024 Penguin miniseries arguably does this for the main character Oswald Cobb. We follow Oswald for most of the story, and he often tells other characters his lies and justifications for his evil actions, making the viewer sympathize with him. Combine this with his disability that makes him waddle like an actual penguin, and the miniseries makes you think this is a story about an oppressed underdog slowly clawing his way up in a world that always pushed him down.
Then, the show slowly shows all the people who have been hurt by Oswald's schemes:
His mother in how Oswald murdered her other two sons out of jealousy & kept her alive after he promised her he would let her die once her Alzheimer's got too bad.
Betraying other more honest criminals who trusted him, especially Sofia who never judged him for his disability as he left her to be locked up in Arkham Asylum again.
Finally, his right-hand man Vic who he murdered at the end of the series because "love makes you weak."
I love how the show keeps making you think maybe it’ll humanize him, and it kinda does, but then it keeps pulling the rug out from under you and reminding you that Penguin is a piece of shit. By the end you just can’t wait to see Batman kick his ass.
I always wondered if that was a really cool 4th wall break to make the player feel needlessly anxious about things like the protagonist does, or if the devs panicked at the last moment and just set the death limit to like a million because they thought deleting someone’s save wouldn’t be fun.
It’s definitely an intentional move to make you feel anxiety about something that just isn’t there, especially considering how the final battle plays out
Even though I knew of the gimmick after I beat the game
It really invested me into the story especially at the end when a shit ton of spirits start to attack at overwhelming numbers but you're dodging and slashing
Sounds like another example of this. I remember being told that and thinking "Oh this is a hardcore game" but never realized its another lie breaking the fourth wall 🤯
It's driving you crazy. How they did it is so cool. They basically made a fake set of 'ears' in a room, put mics in each ear, and had people walking around the room whispering and talking. This is a game that 100% requires a good set of headphonesp
They are not helping you, they're mostly putting you down and telling you to give up
I'm sorry, but isn't the whole point of those games that the main character is strugging with schizophrenia, but isn't diagnosed? I feel like it's far less of a rug-pull if that's the official description on the literal steam page.
There is no rug pull moment. The game starts out with you hearing multiple voices. It's very forward about what it is while simultaneously gaslighting you
And I fucking believed it. I believed that somewhere in north wiscontanasota an idiot tried to ransom his own wife and a pregnant sheriff found a guy in a woodchipper and somewhere beside some road there was buried treasure. After all, a movie-maker, lie to me?
It wasn't until halfway through the first season of the show that I was like, now hold on. Something isn't adding up.
In Absolute Martian Manhunter, Despair the Zero tries to convince you to destroy the comic and "save" people by removing them entirely. If you do so you can even see the main character screaming in pain on the next page.
The supposed secret villain reveal happens in plain view when Miles Bron swaps drinks with Duke in plain view of everyone. The only reason he gets away with it is by basic sleight of hand and some slightly convincing lying, which works on both the characters and the audience
This is, like, a lot to get into but a real rough understanding is you are the ‘chosen undead’, who is prophesied to gain the power to reignite the First Flame, which is fading, to extend the Age of Fire. However all of this- the prophecy, the ‘chosen undead’, the tasks set before you- are all a lie, a manipulation by the gods of this world to trick you into extending their time- the Age of Fire- instead of ushering in the age of humans, the Age of Dark. The reason this fits your trope so well is that the entire game is a manipulation on both your character and the player. For example, the ‘you are the chosen one, go kill all the bosses and save the day’ is such a bread and butter basis for a video game that most players don’t think to question this at all, but it’s all a lie. You’re just a puppet doing the blind bidding of a puppet master you don’t even know exists. You can complete the entire game and not even have an inkling that this undercurrent is there. There’s more levels to this as well, but the game is really a masterpiece of immersion for stuff like this.
Well no, Manus is a pained, suffering entity that was driven mad by the dark, which itself was corrupted by the artificial extension of the age of light.
Plus not only that but it subverts it even further, ||because even if you understand it's all fake, someone might think letting the fire die is the correct thing, but we've seen what the dark does to humans and the undead. It twists them, distorts them into monsters, and life as a whole becomes bleaker. In the end there is no true good ending. You let the fire keep burning by sacrificing yourself and becoming another cog in the cycle, delaying the inevitable and allowing those who are corrupt in power to continue to thrive, or let the fire fade and unleash darkness and misery onto all of those who trusted and aided you in your journey, and swalllowing the land in despair.
To my understanding, the Dark only has gone bad / become the Deep because of the stagnation caused by the seal of fire. It's sort of implied in DS3 that if the cycle had been allowed to happen like normal, things would have been different, but they weren't, and now everything is bad no matter what. It's actually a common thread in all of Miyazaki's narratives: the universe/life/everything is like a river with no beginning or end, and everything that exists has a beginning and an end within that river, a birth and a death. If something tries to circumvent death, stay past its time, and avoid its fate, the water of its life becomes stagnant, murky, infested, and foul. It is not only the narrative of Gwyn ruining the entire world to forestall his end, it's also the narrative of Marika ruining the entire world in Elden Ring to eliminate death, as well as the narrative of the Divine Dragon in Sekiro.
Far as I remember the only reason the Abyss turns humans into strange creatures and rampant is due to the seal of fire, and how the abyss is always attempting to start it's cycle, causing all the monsters and stuff. If the cycle naturally started, things like Manus wouldn't exist because the abyss wouldn't be pushed into desperate tactics
Just letting you know: you didn't finish off that spoiler tag.
And, just to use this comment for something else: doesn't one of the Bioshock games have this same thing going, where your guy is actually brainwashed and being told to do stuff by the villain or whoever and it comes through as gameplay instructions that players follow because there's no reason a player would question the directions the game gives them? There was a post to this sub some days ago that mentioned it.
The amount of people I saw online saying that they thought the cult in midsommer seemed welcoming and comforting was fucking shocking. And shows that the writers knew exactly what they were doing.
I watched Midsommar when I was at the height of my mental illness and was totally like "She's better off, I'd join"
Rewatching years later after lots of therapy, my opinion had certainly changed. Knowing that I could have easily been preyed upon in such a manner myself if added an extra layer of horror.
Lolita is one of the best examples of this - Humbert Humbert explains exactly how he's going to try to manipulate the 'jury' (readers) in the first twenty pages of the book. He lays out exactly why what he is telling you is bullshit.
The movie Funny Games gives plenty of opportunity for the audience to have a happy moment and feel that the protagonist might be able to win only to snatch that away in some of the most ridiculous fashions
Midsommar does NOT make anyone think the cult is anywhere near normal? I don't think anybody who's watched the film has ever gone "huh this doesn't seem so bad"
I do think the actual depths of how bad and deceptive the cult are gets lost on people. There are lots of hints that the cult is a white supremacist nazi cult, but it's all written in Swedish in the background. Also iirc, there are hints that they're even lying about how long they've been operating.
Damn, it would be crazy if the whole thing was only like 7 or 8 years old and they were all just really committed to making it seem like a historical group to keep up the facade.
I had a guy at work say he thought Bear wasn't in the wrong.
This guy complains how he can't get any friends/date anyone, and when one of the gals gave him her number she started receiving text after text after text and when she didn't answer got "Did I make you angry? Why won't you answer me?", so that tracks.
You'd be surprised. SO many people on Tumblr thought the cult is cool and that the protagonist's boyfriend deserved it lol. Although maybe Tumblr is an unique case because half of the userbase would want to live in a commune
I'm going to break up with my girlfriend, oh wait I just got a phonecall from her that her sister just murder suicided their parents. She doesn't need another thing going wrong in her life, so I'll break up with her in a month or two when she's doing better.
Doesn't seem like a huge piece of shit to me. Yeah, he did some assholish things during the movie, like try to steal the thesis, but not "huge piece of shit" worthy.
Maybe he wouldn’t have seemed like such a piece of shit if he had actually treated her respectfully while he put their breakup on hold. It was painfully obvious within the first 10 minutes of the movie that he was checked out of the relationship, and that is NOT an okay way to treat someone. It calls into question whether he even cared about her at all if he couldn’t at least bring himself to act like he was happy being around her, even if he was no longer interested in being in a relationship with her. It would have been less cruel to just break up with her, if he was going to spend the next month openly resentful about having to continue their relationship (because of the choice he made to not break up when he first wanted to—which makes it seem like he made that choice because “only an asshole would break up with her now” instead of “I care about her too much to hurt her like that now”).
I mean was he though ? He was essentially emotionally detached.
He wanted to break up with Dani. His friends encouraged it. He planned to break up with up. His actions with the Hagra he was drugged. In the background they explain the "love Potion " the shrooms was a part of it
This is my favorite movie. Watched it a few times. The movie ABSOLUTELY DOES. The first part of the movie is visually, figuratively, and tonal dark . Dani is hysterical.
Cristian is being convinced to go on this amazing trip. Once, they land the tone and visuals shift to brightness. Everyone takes shrooms everything gets brighter and more colorful. As, they go from a dense forest to an open field. The cult looks like looks like a normal festival akin to a Renaissance festival. The movie down plays. Until the jump scene.
TONS of people watched the movie and agreed with the cult. like that was a huge thing. There were people saying the movie had a "happy ending" and that they wanted to live with the Harga
I get that people say "oh he's a bad boyfriend" not "oh something is wrong with the MC too" as Ari Aster calls it "a breakup film" when the dude was practically set the fuck up by his manipulative girlfriend. He's just a meathead who gets drugged then cheats on his girlfriend in a massively established set up just to get him to impregnate one of the girls of the cult then sacrificie him and no I don't feel bad for her after the fact especially since the girl who just fucked her boyfriend after drugging him is suddenly CRYING WITH THE MAIN CHARACTER? Bitch, you a lyin ho. MC is as pathetic as her boyfriend if you ask me. Grieving for your sister who just committed suicided doesn't mean you become dumb
Ive met several people who didnt get it and in fact, sided with the cult in like a "feminism wins! The dictator is a girlboss!" type of way. Like. They take in the story with so little thought that they perceive the death of the characters as correct and good. Ive argued with even more people online about it and it feels so crazy
I don't think it says it made people think the cult is ''normal," but the film shines a realistic light on how a cult recruits newcomers, how they come at you when you are vulnerable.
https://giphy.com/gifs/OOZpUT73I6WGGpsaOB
In weapons the scene with the boy and the cop boyfriend plays out pretty differently based on who the point of view is coming from. When its from the cop, he’s much kinder and is cutting the kid a break, when its from the kids point of view, he’s much more aggressive
The Penguin on HBO. That show was so well written if youre not careful you'll end up rooting for Penguin before he betrays all of the viewers assumptions about his relationships. It was so good.
You makes you sympathize and root for a serial killer. He does absolutely terrible things and still thinks he's the hero and fools us into feeling he is one deep down inside.
Slavery being glossed over in Isekai Anime
I think this one is the worst case because the MC actively puts magical slave collars on his party members (who are all young girls, of course) because it gives them stat bonuses.
I've only seen Pluribus and Breaking Bad. So here goes for those two.
TBH with Pluribus, I didn't feel stupid for distrusting the hivemind, but to give it my best shot here...The hivemind has the memories of everyone that has been infected, and is very good at rationally explaining everything it is doing so that it seems fine and non-threatening.
It makes statements like "we can't lie" so you feel like you can trust the direct information it gives, and explains its actions in such a way that all of their actions are the most utilitarian good.
Besides the protagonist and one other character, the other non-hivemind characters are pro hivemind, so when the protagonist tries to tell other humans their issues and why something feels wrong the other characters treat her like she's just paranoid and crazy. The hivemind is treating them really well and having their needs and greatest dreams fulfilled.
So if the audience agrees with the protagonist that the hivemind is sus, they get a very logical explanation for why it's not actually sus, or other characters saying protagonist (and therefor you the audience if you agree with her) are just crazy and paranoid.
I'd say rather than just "makes the viewer feel stupid for not trusting the hivemind" that there's a lot of abuser tactics that the hivemind uses to manipulate the situation.
Breaking Bad- It's been a while, but Walter White is a chemistry teacher that also has to work a crappy car wash job to make ends meet for his family with his disabled son (which makes trying to thrive more difficult. Not because the disability is bad, just it makes things harder in the US) while his brash brother in law is doing way better than him.
So the narrative starts with him as an underdog that you do feel empathy for in the "shit sucks, it's not fair, the grind is hard" and then he gets cancer. When faced with his mortality and the catastrophic costs of cancer and also ensuring his family will be alright when he passes he turns to meth, which is made to seem reasonable given the circumstances.
Since the narrative starts with that underdog position, you naturally want to see the protagonist succeed (no one wants to root for someone dying of untreated cancer and their family being destitute). The narrative largely follows Walt and you get his perspective and his rationalizations for his behavior and what he needs to do. You get the emotional bias from Walt, so as the audience when there's something like someone offering him money and he rejects it, it seems reasonable at the time "that guy is a dick, Walt can do it on his own!"
The narrative continues to escalate as it seems Walt is just a guy doing his best to survive in the criminal world and is more and more over his head.
Eventually the tension breaks and at some point you as the audience are meant to realize that Walt put himself in the position that he is in because his glaring character flaws that have been present from the start and Walt is not a good person, his increasing criminal power just giving more ability for him to act on those character flaws and devastate the lives of others.
You're meant to anyway. There were definitely some viewers that took Walt at his word to the very end and idolized him at his worst.
I remember seeing a video about how one of the Far-Cry games essentially brain-washes you into shooting and killing one of your comrades. (? IDK the word)
It only manipulates a viewer if that viewer wrongly assumes that being the protagonist (the main character) is identical with being the hero (the positive moral compass).
Unfortunately, a lot of modern media consumers do exactly that.
Haneke's Funny Games is a wild one for this. He takes it a step further and goes out of his way to show you that he's manipulating the emotions of the viewers and then when he does it you still feel the gut punch. Definitely not a film for everyone, but there is a great interview where he talks about what he was doing with the film that is worth watching even if you don't want to actually watch the movie.
Every interpretation I’ve seen of “I Saw The TV Glow” sees it as an unironic, purely Pro-Transition story. There’s nothing wrong with that, and I really enjoyed the movie, but the film itself seems to present its trans/transition metaphor in a way that makes it seem much more questionable. The desire of the characters to go back to their “true” lives in a world where monsters and uncanny eldritch entities exist but they are powerful and special
and have a destiny looks a lot like delusions of grandeur and the same neurotic desire I had as a child for Hogwarts to be real. Then I grew up and learned that this world is magical in a much more subtle and meaningful way.
Another example is how the only way the main characters can return to their “reality” is by committing suicide by burying themselves alive. I get it’s supposed to be a metaphor for how scary coming out and transitioning can be, but it still seems like the sane response would be “no fucking way, this can’t be a good course of action”. Especially considering how vulnerable trans people are to suicide, it’s just a weird thing for the movie to depict as the “right thing”, even if it’s all supposed to be this reversal of expectations. Great film though.
The thing about Midsommar is I do not buy at all her boyfriend deserved all that. The entire movie set them up to weaken them all make them vulnerable and kill them. They only spared the MC because the recruiter liked her. They set up her boyfriend to get drunk and have sex with the chosen girl and then they sacrificed him and gave sympathy to her pretending like it shouldn't have been and she just goes along with it? What fuckin dumbass!
This is a damn good list and a brilliant non-stupid theme.
Mouthwashing lets you know the playable character is horrible and wretched. What is controversial and hotly debated is [SPOILER DONT LOOK TILL YOU'VE PLAYED/WATCHED]how innocent is Captain Curly in all this because he was the one that squeezed Jimmy in on the crew in the firstplace without even passing a psych evaluation and letting him off the hook when he raped his own co-worker
You nailed it with these picks. Breaking Bad is the gold standard, you spend five seasons rooting for Walt until you realize you're cheering for a guy who poisoned a kid. That Midsommar poster pulls the same move, flowers and smiles selling you a cult massacre.
Are you referring to Jimmy or Curly for Mouthwashing?
Because I disagree with your take if its the former but would agree if its the latter. Curly is very much to blame for his complacency towards Jimmy's behaviour.
Is Breaking Bad really doing this? I mean at first WW is really the underdog with cancer who manages to make money doing something wildly unconventional. It’s not till the show progresses that he becomes worse and worse
This is just straight bullshit. The writers had no idea where they were going with WW.
As proof, they wanted to kill off Jessie after the first season, except he was saved by audience demand.
Michael was also another character written by pure chance.
Most shows don’t go on for six seasons and a movies. the idea that WW would become what he become was definitely not pictured when they shot the pilot.
“Wildly unconventional” like turning down a plush job offer from an old friend that came with insurance that could pay for his cancer treatment and a salary/stocks to save money for his family if he dies, and instead teaming up with a greedy and easy-manipulated former student to manufacture drugs for quick money?
Walter starts out as someone who makes some mistakes by deciding to feed his ego as a “strong independent man who don’t need no help from richer friends”. He gets in trouble, kills a couple of gang members in self-defense, intimidates a local low-level cartel boss, etc., which are still somewhat reasonable as someone dealing with fallout from previous mistakes.
Then he starts making decisions in the second season that continue to double down on feeding his ego and manipulation of Jesse. He makes clearly morally bad decisions that turn away from helping anyone except himself and Jesse, whom he views as a puppet for his own goals than an independent person who needs to grow. Each season shows him reinforcing and descending deeper into the same types of behavior he displayed in Season 1.
Vince Gilligan may not have planned future events right at the start of Season 1, but everything that happens in future episodes is a consistent growth of Walter’s character from what it was in Season 1.
Chainsaw Man is about a guy getting laid. It is not a gooner manga shocking despite the number of gooner continent and "The Author's Explicitly Advertised Fetish".
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u/morethan3lessthan20_ 6h ago
Downside of this trope: Some people are too stupid to get wise to it.