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That sequence was so funny, one of the best moments in the film for me. A lot of the jokes definitely landed well, I also loved the deadpan "I think they're getting suspicious" while the 'copy' of Chris Pine is starting to go all loopy.

Thought Michelle Rodriguez was a fine casting for the role and most importantly it was believable when she was beating the crap out of people. I would line it alongside someone like Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2, where again she had prepared physically for the role and you could believe that she could take care of herself. Perhaps contrast with Emilia Clarke playing the same role, and who I like as an actor, but didn't have the physical presence to pull off the same level of 'threat'. (Just my thoughts on it).

 Overread wrote:
Honestly I've not even worked out what "wokeness" even really is. It seems to shift and change meaning depending on if you're using it in the positive or the negative and on which generation you're in and even which social groups within a generation you're in.

The general definition I've seen is 'substituting the cause du jure for decent storytelling'. Bonus points for using said cause as a hammer to beat down critics pointing out the lack of decent storytelling.


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 nels1031 wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
Imagine shooting Conan and instead of casting a body builder they take Rick Moranis.

That would have been pretty awesome, actually.

Well, it would have been hilarious, but in a serious movie like Conan The Barbarian, it would have looked pretty badly out of place. Carry on into the weak sequel Conan The Destroyer, and imagine Rick Moranis trying to look convincing fighting Wilt Chamberlain, and then convincingly wrestle the horn off Andre the Giant in that monster suit.

Like I said, it would be hilarious, but would destroy any pretense of seriousness in the story.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Paradigm wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
Have fun with your emasculated main character! Meanwhile I am watching Conan from the 80s. Besides people like you would have been booted from our gaming group asap. We don´t suffer political ideologies at RPG games.

I'll take my 'emasculated' characters (though having not watched the film, I have no idea how you'd apply that or any other description to any of the characters therein with any sort of authority ) over your white-male-power-fantasy-Conan types any day. Partly because the latter utterly bores me, but mostly because I want the media I engage with and the games I play to be accessible to more than just grumpy old white dudes stuck somewhere in the late 1980s...

The good news is that 'people like me' will still have gaming groups and movies to enjoy many years from now, while those of you that cannot handle the idea of a woman in an action role or a male lead who sings and dances better than he fights will find yourselves with both a rapidly dwindling and highly insular community to play with, and no movies left to enjoy save for those on your VHS shelves. That is, if you don't all eventually die off from heart attacks brought on by the frankly hilarious rage you all seem to feel when someone who doesn't look, sound, act or think like you gets to see themselves in fiction.

You do realize you're berating the generation and the fandom that put Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor on the map. right?

A strong woman is not the same as a strong man. She's not inferior, just different. If your strong 'female' character is just a male character, exhibiting male behavior and strengths instead of female, and the only indication that the character is female is that they're played by a female actor, that's not being bold and innovative.

That's just poor writing.

As far as raging goes, I don't see any point to that either. If you substitute cause du jure for good writing, I'll vote against it in the way that matters most in America. With my wallet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Backfire wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:

Barbarian:
Bad casting choice. Next time hire a tall, muscular woman. She may not be able to act like a professional but at least she looks the part to make the fight scenes believable. And with fight scene I don´t mean CGI stuff where the woman turns into an owlbear and hurls people around like in a video game. That was bad and takes agency from the actors.
Imagine Brock Lesnar getting beaten by a midget. You won´t see it at WWE. Why? It would look stupid. Wrestling folks know this but in Hollywood everything which may empower women is good enough for the flick.

Does Rey Mysterio count as a midget?

Women have won WWE Cruiserweight title (Chyna, at least), and Tessa Blanchard won Impact Championship. Vince McMahon and David Arquette have won Championship belts. Plenty of silly stuff happens to stretch the Kayfabe...

Why is Doric turning into Owlbear "bad"? Are you implying that it would not happen in actual D&D, or that it would be better if it was a male druid? Isn't that sort of concept exactly what you call for, a 'believable' method how a tiny woman could beat up armed guys?

I'm bit baffled why you hold Conan as some sort of paragon of 'believable non-wokeness', as in that movie you have Valeria beating up dudes (and even running away from her in fear), and she saves Conan's life (twice, IIRC).

Yep. With agility and speed, not with brute force. (At least not until she becomes a Valkyrie at the end of the movie, anyway.) Another great strong female character, that is strong in a perfectly feminine way that is not at all inferior to her male counterparts. The series also gave us Zula, played by Grace Jones. Agility. ferocity, and raw determination, not brute force.

Switching over to Star Wars. One of the best written characters outside the movies is Asoka Tano. She gets one heck of an arc, earns her skill and power the hard way, and is beloved by the fanbase - female AND male. She is everything Rey Palpatine is NOT... not least of which is 'well written'. The Sith Assassin Asajj Ventress was also quite the powerful female character in the series.

Then there's Padme Amidala and her 'aggressive negotiations'. Flexibility, skill, and precision, not brute force.

Then there's Sergent Vasquez from Aliens. You never got the impression from her that ANY standards were lowered for her to be allowed to serve. But where the larger men slide by on size and strength, she substitutes raw determination to keep up.

The Incredibles; Helen and Violet Parr held their own against their male counterparts just fine.

No one complained about the Black Widow holding her own with her superpowered counterparts.

Anyone remember Laura Croft? Not much whining about HER being a strong female character.

A lot of the manufactured outrage over pushback against 'strong female characters' is just that: manufactured. It's being used to excuse bad writing, under the myth that before Jennifer Lawrence and Brie Larson there were no strong female characters, ever. Geeks LOVE strong female characters, so long as they are well written.

(Now comes the excuses why the strong female characters of the past are not ACTUALLY strong female characters. Ellen Ripley was just a glorified final girl; Laura Croft and Black Widow were just eye candy; etc. etc. etc. If she predates 2015 she doesn't count 'for reasons'...)

EDIT: Now I have to say, I haven't seen the movie yet, so I can't say if Rodriguez pulled off the barbarian role suitably naturally. Based on past performances I have no doubts the actress can pull it off; I simply have my doubts about the director, editors, and stunt choreographers in the modern Hollywood climate making it look right. She's 5'5" and around 120 lbs; she CANNOT go brute force against brute force and have it look good. She'd have to play speed, skill, agility, and determination against brute force to pull it off.

So please, tell me. Did she play to her female strengths? Or did she just brute-force everything as if she were a man twice her actual mass?

 Vulcan wrote:

You do realize you're berating the generation and the fandom that put Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor on the map. right?

I am aware of that, but I think it really goes to prove my point. My argument is not that there were no women in action roles prior to the 2010s, but rather that those that were there were notable exceptions; for every one Sarah Connor or Ellen Ripley there are a dozen, broadly interchangable Arnie/Harrison Ford/Kurt Russel/Bruce Willis ect. male action hero types to the extent that whenever this comes up, the two aforementioned women are literally the only ones from that era that most people can bring up off the top of their heads. That is not to say anything about the quality of the roles, just the maths of it.

The point of progress is to get to the stage where this isn't a concern anyone has, where anyone can play anything and no one bats an eye. This is where DnD is quite strong in this regard, absolutely nothing is made of the women being the frontline fighters (both the barbarian and, via the Owlbear wildshape, the Druid) and the men are the thinker/strategist and the support caster, and that's as it should be. Because boiling things down to 'male' and 'female' traits or gendered ways of fulfilling certain roles is highly reductive, bordering on offensive if done particularly poorly (Black Widow's fight scenes in Iron Man 2 being a good example of that, that has not aged well compared to much of her later action).

This is before you get into the nature of this movie being both a fantasy and a game adaptation. In modern DnD, gender has no bearing on strength or constitution scores, and thus a teenage female half-elf barbarian can be rocking the exact same stat spread as the grizzled male Orc, with no issue or need to interpret these differently beyond what the players want to do in that regard. Add on to that that fantasy heroes/protagonists in both the game and this kind of movie are by their very nature exceptional individuals, and anyone who has an issue with the casting/portrayal of Holga for reasons of 'realism' or the like is probably just looking for an excuse to push an outdated agenda.

So please, tell me. Did she play to her female strengths? Or did she just brute-force everything as if she were a man twice her actual mass?

This right here is the exact BS I'm talking about as needing to go. The concept of 'female strengths' as something that requires an action movie heroine to be portrayed in a certain way, different to a male counterpart, to meet with approval is reductive, dated and misses the point entirely.

For the record, her fight coreography is an excellent portrayal of a DnD barbarian, which is to say that if you're expecting realism you're in the wrong movie. She's fast, vicious, shrugs off wounds with little more than a grimace and even bare-handed. tosses around dudes in heavy armour in a way that is entirely 'unrealsitic' and also captures the fantasy of a raging, 20-STR character using improvised weapons and defences perfectly. If you're wanting action that cares about relative body mass, the danger of numerical advantages or the proper use of weapons, this ain't it, but if you want to see a character whose skillset is 'really good at beating anyone up, with anything, at any time', then you're going to have a good time with it.

 Paradigm wrote:
and thus a teenage female half-elf barbarian can be rocking the exact same stat spread as the grizzled male Orc

Oh you've seen the Japanese 5E release pregens?

Vulcan wrote:You do realize you're berating the generation and the fandom that put Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor on the map. right?

The idea that generations get credit for anything that happens while they happen to be alive is absurd.

The idea that fandoms get credit for creating something that, by definition, has to have existed before they formed is just stupid.

 Ahtman wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
and thus a teenage female half-elf barbarian can be rocking the exact same stat spread as the grizzled male Orc

Oh you've seen the Japanese 5E release pregens?

Spoiler:

I'm kidding, of course. She is a teenage human female Fighter (Atria Dawnguard, female human fighter - age 17)



No this isn't a random anime image this is the official 5E character.

I swear. Japan is the most American country outside of America. They are just absolutely off the wall.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Voss wrote:

Vulcan wrote:You do realize you're berating the generation and the fandom that put Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor on the map. right?

The idea that generations get credit for anything that happens while they happen to be alive is absurd.

The idea that fandoms get credit for creating something that, by definition, has to have existed before they formed is just stupid.

Absolute truth and murder at the same time.

Backfire wrote:
Really I don't understand why a scene designed for all around comedy is example of 'wokeness' or 'emasculation'. It's actually how a wicked GM would 'play' the corpse: "What, did that count as a question? -Yes. -So we have only three questions left? -No, you have only two left. -[Others:] Shut up!! Don't you ever learn!? -No. One remaining..."

Taken in a vacuum it's easy to see why: The straight white male lead is an idiot, and ruins what they're doing whilst everyone else (who aren't white and/or male) rolls their eyes at him.

But that's why Context is King. You remove context, you remove meaning, and removing that scene from the context of the rest of the film robs it of its meaning.

 Lance845 wrote:
Lets not pretend being upset that Michelle Rodriguez is the competent front line fighter as being "woke" is anything but misogyny.

A baseless assumption. She's not all that big, and seeing her fight people that should wreck her gak and pointing that out isn't "misogyny".

Now I personally didn't care, because this is a world of magic and raging barbarians, so whose to say her sub-type of people aren't just weirdly strong without it presenting in the standard physical ways that we see it, but to pretend that any criticism of a smaller woman playing a massively physical role is "anything but misogyny" is the type of debate-killing, speech-destroying shutdown tactics that ruin any sort of modern discourse.

Voss wrote:

Vulcan wrote:You do realize you're berating the generation and the fandom that put Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor on the map. right?

The idea that generations get credit for anything that happens while they happen to be alive is absurd.

The idea that fandoms get credit for creating something that, by definition, has to have existed before they formed is just stupid.

Without a fandom - or more to the point, the MONEY the fandom tosses at a franchise - you don't have a franchise, you have a one-off movie that everyone forgets in a handful of years.

Before Star Wars, franchises simply were not a thing. And where did the money to make Star Wars successful enough to become what it is now? The Fandom. WE paid George the money for Empire. WE paid George the money for Return of the Jedi. WE paid the money into the EU that kept Star Wars a viable franchise until the prequels, and then did it again until the sequels.

Star Trek was kept going by the money and the hard work of the fandom until The Motion Picture was released.

Without the money the fandom spent on Terminator and Alien, there would have been no Terminator 2 and Aliens.

That's an easy thing to forget, and it appears Disney has long forgotten it. But if the people you want to be your customers don't like the product you're producing, they won't give you money for it and your product fails. It really is that easy.

 Paradigm wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:

You do realize you're berating the generation and the fandom that put Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor on the map. right?

I am aware of that, but I think it really goes to prove my point. My argument is not that there were no women in action roles prior to the 2010s, but rather that those that were there were notable exceptions; for every one Sarah Connor or Ellen Ripley there are a dozen, broadly interchangable Arnie/Harrison Ford/Kurt Russel/Bruce Willis ect. male action hero types to the extent that whenever this comes up, the two aforementioned women are literally the only ones from that era that most people can bring up off the top of their heads. That is not to say anything about the quality of the roles, just the maths of it.

I'm not going to argue that there are a bunch more male action heroes than female action heroes. That is just fact. There are quite a few more female action heroes from the same period of filmmaking. Sadly. studios generally did not put the money into their movies to make those movies any good, even by 1980s action hero standards. Thus, the writing writing was bad, the directing was bad, the effects were bad... just bad all over. This is the fault of the studios, not the actresses... or the action movie fandom. Just like now, if you want the money you can't just shovel out garbage and expect it to sell.

The point of progress is to get to the stage where this isn't a concern anyone has, where anyone can play anything and no one bats an eye. This is where DnD is quite strong in this regard, absolutely nothing is made of the women being the frontline fighters (both the barbarian and, via the Owlbear wildshape, the Druid) and the men are the thinker/strategist and the support caster, and that's as it should be. Because boiling things down to 'male' and 'female' traits or gendered ways of fulfilling certain roles is highly reductive, bordering on offensive if done particularly poorly (Black Widow's fight scenes in Iron Man 2 being a good example of that, that has not aged well compared to much of her later action).

This is before you get into the nature of this movie being both a fantasy and a game adaptation. In modern DnD, gender has no bearing on strength or constitution scores, and thus a teenage female half-elf barbarian can be rocking the exact same stat spread as the grizzled male Orc, with no issue or need to interpret these differently beyond what the players want to do in that regard. Add on to that that fantasy heroes/protagonists in both the game and this kind of movie are by their very nature exceptional individuals, and anyone who has an issue with the casting/portrayal of Holga for reasons of 'realism' or the like is probably just looking for an excuse to push an outdated agenda.

Spoiler:

Not that it needs mentioning at this point, but the majority of foes she faces in this movie are generic guard/soldier types, the sort that no average barbarian in DnD is going to have much trouble taking on. The only 'boss' enemies are a powerful arcane assassin and a mage, handled by the paladin solo and a combined party effort respectively.

So please, tell me. Did she play to her female strengths? Or did she just brute-force everything as if she were a man twice her actual mass?

This right here is the exact BS I'm talking about as needing to go. The concept of 'female strengths' as something that requires an action movie heroine to be portrayed in a certain way, different to a male counterpart, to meet with approval is reductive, dated and misses the point entirely.

That's not BS, that's biology. Or are you going to argue that men and women are, on the average, EXACTLY the same size, weight, and strength?

I'll grant you someone like Rhonda Rousey or Gina Carano would beat me to a pulp and tie what's left up in knots. I'm a fairly average guy... and they are anything BUT average women.

For the record, her fight coreography is an excellent portrayal of a DnD barbarian, which is to say that if you're expecting realism you're in the wrong movie. She's fast, vicious, shrugs off wounds with little more than a grimace and even bare-handed. tosses around dudes in heavy armour in a way that is entirely 'unrealsitic' and also captures the fantasy of a raging, 20-STR character using improvised weapons and defences perfectly. If you're wanting action that cares about relative body mass, the danger of numerical advantages or the proper use of weapons, this ain't it, but if you want to see a character whose skillset is 'really good at beating anyone up, with anything, at any time', then you're going to have a good time with it.

Okay, that's a valid point. If the movie is entertaining enough, things like that can be overlooked. After all, most of us managed to watch Summer Glau go full action heroine in Serenity without complaint.

It's when the movie has ceased to be entertaining that we start looking for the problems. All the more reason to put some money to quality writing FIRST AND FOREMOST.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Backfire wrote:
Really I don't understand why a scene designed for all around comedy is example of 'wokeness' or 'emasculation'. It's actually how a wicked GM would 'play' the corpse: "What, did that count as a question? -Yes. -So we have only three questions left? -No, you have only two left. -[Others:] Shut up!! Don't you ever learn!? -No. One remaining..."

Taken in a vacuum it's easy to see why: The straight white male lead is an idiot, and ruins what they're doing whilst everyone else (who aren't white and/or male) rolls their eyes at him.

But that's why Context is King. You remove context, you remove meaning, and removing that scene from the context of the rest of the film robs it of its meaning.

 Lance845 wrote:
Lets not pretend being upset that Michelle Rodriguez is the competent front line fighter as being "woke" is anything but misogyny.

A baseless assumption. She's not all that big, and seeing her fight people that should wreck her gak and pointing that out isn't "misogyny".

Now I personally didn't care, because this is a world of magic and raging barbarians, so whose to say her sub-type of people aren't just weirdly strong without it presenting in the standard physical ways that we see it, but to pretend that any criticism of a smaller woman playing a massively physical role is "anything but misogyny" is the type of debate-killing, speech-destroying shutdown tactics that ruin any sort of modern discourse.

Baseless nothing.

It's an action movie. We constantly watch males perform feats completely beyond human capability in every movie we watch without complaint or critique of what they would otherwise be capable of.

Heads up, iron man couldn't design a ark reactor and a full suit of armor in a cave with a box of scraps unrealistic nonsense.

Bruce willis couldn't take out an entire building of terrorists on his own without shoes.

Lethal weapons. Nonsense.

Jackie chan movies? Insanity.

Martial arts movies where the enemies come at them one at a time? Total unrealistic garbbage.

Do you like John Wick movies? The physical punishment of any one fight scene would put him in bed for weeks. Not walking to his next fight scene.


The fact that the question is being asked about MR in this movie but never even a talking point for 58 year old keanu reeves is the very definition of misogyny. If the person isn't being actively misogynistic, they are at least acting on sub concious biases that are misogynistic.

So I just saw the film - my view - this is 100% a film which goes out to achieve the "this is a party playing a DnD game" feel. It FEELS like it. It's a fun romp through a fantasy DnD session that has all the good hallmarks without ever breaking the 4th wall and taking you out of the fantasy.




On the barbarian front, she's totally fine nothing wrong with her. What I think might be wrong is her armour/costume. It feels like its just a touch big on her which causes her body to kind of shrink into it. It's not evident on every scene and in some ways I think its a move to avoid overly exposed "boob armour" elements. But I did get the feeling that it was just a size too big for what appeared like it was meant to be close fitting armour instead of chunky/thick plated armour.

I think that might be why she feels a little small; when all else she's rocking a fighting barbarian style like you'd get from a Red Sonja type character. Your classic fighter/barbarian woman fighter without being overmuscled.

She certainly carries that she's the party tank without question.




Overall this is a fun film that sets out just to be that. It's got some serious bits to the story, but at its core this is fun film being fun

 Lance845 wrote:
It's an action movie. We constantly watch males perform feats completely beyond human capability in every movie we watch without complaint or critique of what they would otherwise be capable of.

You're missing the point.

When a tiny woman beats up massive dudes twice her size, it doesn't look right. And calling that out isn't "misogyny".

Go and watch Atomic Blonde and you'll see how to do fights between people of different sizes.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
It's an action movie. We constantly watch males perform feats completely beyond human capability in every movie we watch without complaint or critique of what they would otherwise be capable of.

You're missing the point.

When a tiny woman beats up massive dudes twice her size, it doesn't look right. And calling that out isn't "misogyny".

Go and watch Atomic Blonde and you'll see how to do fights between people of different sizes.

The go-to reference for fights between people of different sizes should really be The Princess Bride.

Height doesn't matter. Unless you're online dating.

 Adeptekon wrote:
Height doesn't matter. Unless you're online dating.

Reach DOES matter. If you can hit the other person while remaining out of their reach, however barely, that's a huge advantage.

And in general, a taller person has longer arms and therefore more reach.

 Vulcan wrote:

 Adeptekon wrote:
Height doesn't matter. Unless you're online dating.

Reach DOES matter. If you can hit the other person while remaining out of their reach, however barely, that's a huge advantage.

And in general, a taller person has longer arms and therefore more reach.

Reach doesn’t necessarily equate to a better fighter. Especially if you can move inside your opponent’s reach. Mike Tyson wasn’t particularly tall nor did he have much reach and his record speaks for itself.

Whoever compared her to Rick Moranis was way off. The natural comparison is someone like Michael Biehn. He isn’t a big guy, but he comes across grizzled enough that the audience is willing to believe he can win a fight. Michelle Rodriguez brings that grizzle.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Whoever compared her to Rick Moranis was way off. The natural comparison is someone like Michael Biehn. He isn’t a big guy, but he comes across grizzled enough that the audience is willing to believe he can win a fight. Michelle Rodriguez brings that grizzle.

Yeah but no one in the cast had "grizzle"
Even the much experienced Paladin with a dark backstory wasn't grizzled.

This wasn't a grizzly film with grizzled heroes in grizzled armour with throats rough as sandpaper and flushed down with whiskey

 Vulcan wrote:

 Adeptekon wrote:
Height doesn't matter. Unless you're online dating.

Reach DOES matter. If you can hit the other person while remaining out of their reach, however barely, that's a huge advantage.

And in general, a taller person has longer arms and therefore more reach.

Reach can matter. It is by no means decisive. Skill, knowledge and tactics count for a lot. If your opponent has a greater reach, you can work round that. Indeed get within that reach and they’re at a significant disadvantage.

All of this is missing the point that we don't expect reality from movies. People fight far longer, in more fights, get up and move without the wear and tear on their body that they should have. Small people beat up big people. People with skills do crazy gak people can't/shouldn't be able to do.

Nobody questions the little flippy guys beating the gak out of everyone, or the huge mountain monsters getting defeated by the smaller guys. Nobody questions the average joe bruce willises plowing through a dozen guys in better shape with better weapons.

This only ever becomes a discussion when the person winning the fight has tits.

 Overread wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Whoever compared her to Rick Moranis was way off. The natural comparison is someone like Michael Biehn. He isn’t a big guy, but he comes across grizzled enough that the audience is willing to believe he can win a fight. Michelle Rodriguez brings that grizzle.

Yeah but no one in the cast had "grizzle"
Even the much experienced Paladin with a dark backstory wasn't grizzled.

This wasn't a grizzly film with grizzled heroes in grizzled armour with throats rough as sandpaper and flushed down with whiskey

To me, MR had that quality where no one else did.

Reach doesn't matter if you can hit the groin.

 Adeptekon wrote:
Reach doesn't matter if you can hit the groin.

Especially with a Great Axe.


The Paladin was a DM PC right?

 Ahtman wrote:

 Adeptekon wrote:
Reach doesn't matter if you can hit the groin.

Especially with a Great Axe.


The Paladin was a DM PC right?

Oh, absolutely. Raises the question; who is the DM?

 Lance845 wrote:
All of this is missing the point that we don't expect reality from movies. People fight far longer, in more fights, get up and move without the wear and tear on their body that they should have. Small people beat up big people. People with skills do crazy gak people can't/shouldn't be able to do.

Nobody questions the little flippy guys beating the gak out of everyone, or the huge mountain monsters getting defeated by the smaller guys. Nobody questions the average joe bruce willises plowing through a dozen guys in better shape with better weapons.

This only ever becomes a discussion when the person winning the fight has tits.

It's a matter of educating the audience. Non-superpowered female crimefighters have been a thing in superhero comics since the Golden Age. So Scarlett Johansson carving her way through pack of goons is not 'modern woke' (Black Widow character dates back to 1960's). Similarly for example in Wushu genre, main characters are supposed to have not only incredible martial arts techniques, but also control of ki/chi, which gives them superhuman abilities. So women, or old men beating up bunch of young, fit dudes is nothing extraordinary. It is established lore in those genres that yes, such things are plausible (among other, much more fantastical things).

However, if I was to make, say, a boxing movie, and have a woman (or flyweight) beat Tyson Fury or Joe Frazier, it would look stupid, and audience would rightly complain. So, setting matters, and not all elements fit in all settings. 'Die Hards' are very unrealistic movies, but people don't expect to see characters with magic powers in them.

Backfire wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
All of this is missing the point that we don't expect reality from movies. People fight far longer, in more fights, get up and move without the wear and tear on their body that they should have. Small people beat up big people. People with skills do crazy gak people can't/shouldn't be able to do.

Nobody questions the little flippy guys beating the gak out of everyone, or the huge mountain monsters getting defeated by the smaller guys. Nobody questions the average joe bruce willises plowing through a dozen guys in better shape with better weapons.

This only ever becomes a discussion when the person winning the fight has tits.

It's a matter of educating the audience. Non-superpowered female crimefighters have been a thing in superhero comics since the Golden Age. So Scarlett Johansson carving her way through pack of goons is not 'modern woke' (Black Widow character dates back to 1960's). Similarly for example in Wushu genre, main characters are supposed to have not only incredible martial arts techniques, but also control of ki/chi, which gives them superhuman abilities. So women, or old men beating up bunch of young, fit dudes is nothing extraordinary. It is established lore in those genres that yes, such things are plausible (among other, much more fantastical things).

However, if I was to make, say, a boxing movie, and have a woman (or flyweight) beat Tyson Fury or Joe Frazier, it would look stupid, and audience would rightly complain. So, setting matters, and not all elements fit in all settings. 'Die Hards' are very unrealistic movies, but people don't expect to see characters with magic powers in them.

Cool. So the setting is the Forgotten Realm of DnD.

What do you think?

Think I have already wrote my thoughts? It's Forgotten Realms, where the most legendary fighter is skinny, weaker gender Drow...

Alright, I finally got the movie watched, no longer have to worry about spoilers, and can jump back in the threads to see what all these pages of discussion I’ve been missing are about!

Aash wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:

 Adeptekon wrote:
Height doesn't matter. Unless you're online dating.

Reach DOES matter. If you can hit the other person while remaining out of their reach, however barely, that's a huge advantage.

And in general, a taller person has longer arms and therefore more reach.

Reach doesn’t necessarily equate to a better fighter. Especially if you can move inside your opponent’s reach. Mike Tyson wasn’t particularly tall nor did he have much reach and his record speaks for itself.

I never said reach DOES equate to a better fighter. I just said it MATTERS and was a big advantage. Strength, agility, endurance, speed, reach, mass, skill, experience.... all these things matter in a fight. But no single one of them trump over all the others.

Of course, if you 'get inside someone's reach' in a fistfight, you're probably going to get a knee or elbow somewhere you don't want it. Fistfights are not like boxing, with rules and all. Try to box politely in a fistfight and you'll probably get your head handed back to you.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lance845 wrote:
All of this is missing the point that we don't expect reality from movies. People fight far longer, in more fights, get up and move without the wear and tear on their body that they should have. Small people beat up big people. People with skills do crazy gak people can't/shouldn't be able to do.

Nobody questions the little flippy guys beating the gak out of everyone, or the huge mountain monsters getting defeated by the smaller guys. Nobody questions the average joe bruce willises plowing through a dozen guys in better shape with better weapons.

This only ever becomes a discussion when the person winning the fight has tits.

No, it becomes a discussion when the movie was bad and we're looking for something to talk about.

As I said earlier I don't remember a lot of people having problems with Summer Glau's big battle. Why? Because we were entertained. When the movie ceases to entertain us, we start nitpicking...

 Vulcan wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
All of this is missing the point that we don't expect reality from movies. People fight far longer, in more fights, get up and move without the wear and tear on their body that they should have. Small people beat up big people. People with skills do crazy gak people can't/shouldn't be able to do.

Nobody questions the little flippy guys beating the gak out of everyone, or the huge mountain monsters getting defeated by the smaller guys. Nobody questions the average joe bruce willises plowing through a dozen guys in better shape with better weapons.

This only ever becomes a discussion when the person winning the fight has tits.

No, it becomes a discussion when the movie was bad and we're looking for something to talk about.

As I said earlier I don't remember a lot of people having problems with Summer Glau's big battle. Why? Because we were entertained. When the movie ceases to entertain us, we start nitpicking...

In this particular case it came from someone who Didn't see the movie. While those who saw the movie have near universal positive feedback for it.