Nicki Minaj is straight (years ago said she was bi, but has since walked that back), Megan Thee Stallion and Chappell Roan are queer, I think Dua Lipa is straight herself but has a large LGBTQ+ fanbase.
Thag Simmons
I mean I think Nicki is also quite popular with the gays. Honestly if you become a big popstar without amassing a large queer fanbase you’re probably doing something wrong.
That might have waned a bit for Nicki in recent years, since she’s been doing a lot of things wrong lately, but certainly during her peak years
Yumi
Yeah, it just seems Dua Lipa’s on another level from Nicki with that, where Nicki seems more at the standard pop star level.
the only thing I know about Dua Lipa, is if you scroll through her albums it’s largely just covers of other people’s music, and I only know this because of a youtube channel called FrankyFade that covers (heh) a lot of different music that’s been covered and recovered over and over again (seriously, there are no original ideas anymore) ~<3
Li
Not arguing on any of this, just musing that a lot of artists have walked back coming out as bi only to later reconfirm their identities, and to wonder what the world would look like in terms of out people if there weren’t so much prejudice.
Yumi
For Nicki Minaj specifically, she said that she had just said she was bisexual for attention– which isn’t great. But it also might be like you said, in a less prejudice world, she might position herself differently.
I’m very in favor of people discovering their identity, so that includes someone who thought they were bi and then learned they were straight (whether that’s a change in their understanding or if their sexuality changed)– and then it could change again at a later point. Just don’t love the “made it up for attention” angle.
Li
Right, but like. Is there any other denial she could have used that would have worked?
“I only pretend to be bi for male attention” also feels like something a lot of not terribly straight girls tell themselves while they drink exactly enough alcohol to plausibly deny their genuine interest in kissing other girls at parties.
I’m not absolving Hypothetical Minaj of anything here, internalized biphobia still hurts other people.
I’m just also. Skeptical that anyone has ever actually pretended to be bi “for attention”. The attention it gets you isn’t fun.
Yumi
For your first question, like… yeah? “I realized that wasn’t me,” “Was still figuring things out,” “Loved so many people in the community I thought I might be, too.” Different denials could also connect to various biphobic ideas, unfortunately, because there are a lot of them. But I do think more considerate phrasing could have been chosen. At the same time, it’s a lot to have to navigate in the public eye as part of celebrity status.
I do think people might pretend for attention– the way people will pretend a lot of things for attention. I’m actually pretty sympathetic to this because it seems to come from a place of internal struggles and not being able to figure out how to get your needs met.
Li
I keep trying to keep this from being a massive response and failing!
— I think I specifically meant what other denial would have truly convinced everyone: especially homophobic/biphobic fans, for whom the idea of wanting to be part of the community will never make sense. Doesn’t make it less shitty of her to have said, though! If anything, it would make it worse: a deeper betrayal.
— Agree to disagree. I genuinely don’t think I believe anyone ever pretends to be a marginalized identity just for attention (at least not when they’re attaching that identity to their real life instead of an online sock puppet); but it’s not exactly something we can prove one way or the other.
Minaj says she’s straight and that’s all we’ve got. Pointless to disbelieve her, and definitely doesn’t make the whole debacle any better. Either way, really, I feel sorry for her, but that sympathy doesn’t outweigh the harm she’s done to other people.
Laura
Chrysanthe Tan is non-binary and queer
Queen Anthai
Megan’s straight? Goddammit there go my infinitesimally slim chances. 🙁
Yumi
I… think she’s queer. That’s what I said in the comment you’re replying to. So… you still have a shot!
Im only a fan in passing so take me with a grain of salt and anyone else feel free to correct me here, but Chapell Roan is a very queer artist that’s had a huge boost in her career the past year or two, she won a Grammy this year. She has a song called good luck babe about having a lesbian lover who is in denial and still insists on dating men, that’s so popular it plays on the radio in *my* homophobic ass country. And ik Billie is bisexual so she’s not inherently making herself miserable by dating men but it’s still an incredibly funny irony to me
Dot
Billie is bi but she’s being a repper at the moment
…what, did you start to read a webcomic ten years in? Don’t do that. Go to the beginning, binge till 4 am a few times, and then read daily. Otherwise, lots of things will never make sense.
Needfuldoer
The problem with that strategy is, when you inevitably catch back up to reality, your brain is stuck in the comic’s world and you wan to know more but you’re stuck waiting like everyone else.
Help! I’ve looked this up in lots of ways but still not sure. What does ‘a flex’ mean in this context? A boast? A ‘look I can do this’? Showing off? A bit like flexing ones muscles only in art?
Thag Simmons
Yeah, it’s showing off what you can do artistically, in this case drawing a panel from an uncommon perspective.
Needfuldoer
Pretty much, yeah.
A flex is saying “look at this difficult thing I did the hard way just because I’m capable of doing so!”
From Chappell? I wouldn’t say so, Chappell’s remained pretty relevant, especially since she just put out The Giver. Sabrina’s obviously a big deal, too, but both of them are quite current.
Maybe it’s like when you want to get into horror movies so you look up what the most horrible, depraved, gory one is available because surely if you can take that you can take anything, and if you can’t that just means you dial it back a notch and try again.
Or was that just me.
Hellraiser, for the record. As an old horror pro, I can safely say that even at the time there were worse things on the shelf than Hellraiser, but none that my peers knew about.
My wife refused to watch horror movies because she assumed they’d be traumatizing. I then pointed out she read the most sadistic, violent, crazy crime fiction imaginable. True crime documentaries as well.
When she finally saw horror movies for the first time, she just laughed them off.
I still think that a lot of horror movies depend on background sound/music and ambiance. You can make something that wouldn’t normally be scary with the right ambiance (ie: going into the bike shed on a sunny day with birds singing and everyone chatting vs on a very windy night, with a full moon and the power is out). You add something like yackety sax or fellow movie viewers laughing, and it tends to ruin any fear you might have.
I am personally not a fan of jump scares, as I just normally find them a reflex test and startling but not actually scary (I have seen some in video games that are well done, not overused and don’t feel cheap). I prefer more atmospheric horror. In general, I find stuff in real life to be more horrifying than anything a horror movie normally does. People can do horrific things to each other. A documentary on 9/11, the Holocaust, or a real life stalker is more likely to give me nightmares than a horror movie about a ghost or some other supernatural thing.
Embe13
The bbc panel show QI does an excellent and hilarious breakdown of this concept using shark footage. andit is hosted by sandi tosvig and steven fry, to great gay comics!
I lived a horror movie, I don’t need to watch another one. When I was 13 we had a shooting insurrection blow up around us as the locals tried to change their form of government from a monarchy to an Islamic republic, and the king didn’t take many prisoners, and those that were taken lost hands if they were lucky or heads if they were unlucky. And that was one of the milder horrors I went through as a child.
Embe13
I hope your life is far more peaceful, and the genre you prefer now.
I still get shot at but that’s just where I live, people get drunk and fire (mostly) pistols randomly, usually in the air, but there was a domestic violence murder less than a quarter mile away. And I have lost count of the TVs left out for trash pickup with one or more bullet holes.
But yeah the genre of story I’m in now is generally non-violent, sort of a slapstick comedy where I fall down a lot, generally when I don’t have any pants on. And I do all my own stunts.
Oh Billie/Jennifer, when are you going to wise up that being into Star Wars isn’t nearly as “nerdy” as it used to be? Besides if Alice liked you back then when she knew more about you then presumably just being yourself; then dropping the mask is the way to go.
I guess at this point in the sliding timescale Star Wars has fallen kinda out of place in popular media? Not disappeared, but it’s been a while that it’s close to a generation behind.
When this comic started, the prequel trilogy came out during Billie’s childhood. Currently, Rogue One came out during her childhood.
In a few years, we’ll get a flashback to Billie getting a stuffed Baby Yoda for her 6th birthday, and her holding it tightly in bed because her parents’ consistent absence made that the closest she could get to actually hugging them.
Last Jedi’s almost eight years old at this point and that’s the point when it became clear that Disney’s Star Wars would not be the unstoppable juggernaut that Force Awakens and Rogue One seemed to be heralding.
Honestly I could buy Jennifer having basically any opinion on the post-TLJ canon so long as it’s strong.
This is definitely a timescale thing. At this point Star Wars stuff is definitely mainstream. The Mandolorian and Andor both being extremely popular and award winning series even my parents have seen some of. Andor is even getting season 2 in like a month. The nerd factor is probably watching a lot of the extended stuff. Ahsoka, Acolyte, any of the animated stuff which is really the only way you’d know who Kit Fisto is.
Thag Simmons
Star Wars has always been somewhat mainstream, but I do think the D+ shows represent a slump period. Doesn’t mean it’s something obscure that only the super nerds follow, it’s still got a place in pop culture, but it’s not utterly dominant in the way that Star Wars can be in a peak period.
Charles Phipps
They did a listing of Disney+’s viewers.
Star Wars and Marvel were the entirety of the top ten viewed shows except for Percy Jackson. The Acolyte was #2
People watched Acolyte? Then why did it get cancelled?! I’m still pissed about it!
Thag Simmons
Problem with making shows that cost 230 million is that it becomes a much bigger potential loss to continue with a show that had an awkward first season and didn’t immediately light the world on fire.
Charles Phipps
Acolyte being a streaming only platform meant that it had a smaller potential audience for the amount of money being spent on it.
Jeremiah
All the reason listen above plus all streaming platforms had become a cancer on creative works.
Thag Simmons
Disney+ does not represent the entirety of pop culture.
Charles Phipps
No, but if a show ON Disney+ then it falls on Disney for not making movies instead of streaming service shows.
And the only place to watch the streaming service shows are….their streaming service.
(This isn’t a criticism, I think a major financial failure of Disney was the fact Hawkeye, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Ms. Marvel should have been movies)
Li
I’ll +1 this even though I really like them as TV shows.
Sirksome
I don’t think the problem is that they were shows. I think Disney just overestimated and oversaturated audiences with Marvel stuff because they needed content for their streaming service. People just aren’t gonna watch everything.
Li
Maybe?
But let’s suppose that a million people became Disney+ subscribers specifically to watch Falcon and the Winter Soldier or She-Hulk. Even if they only stay subscribed for a month, that’s still the equivalent of a lot of movie tickets…
But basically impossible for anyone to prove. Which makes it harder to sell executives on future projects. Which means a lot of one-season-only shows that don’t get to tell their full story. Which leads to the same self-fulfilling death spiral Netflix Originals are so often in, where people don’t want to watch them until they’re complete, and they don’t get completed because no one’s watching.
On the flip side, Eternals should have been a TV series. It really needed more space to world-build. As it was, it ended up being way too long and simultaneously not long enough, with a bunch of important character development being just back-filled in flashbacks.
Forget all the non-linear storytelling nonsense. Just start with the Eternals arriving on Earth, and have the first five episodes be moving forward in through (pre)history, each episode having all of the Eternals in it, but focusing on a different pair of them, to illustrate what they do and why they’re there. Have episode six be the team fracturing, ending with them breaking up and scattering across the world.
Then episode 7 could pick up where the movie started, which makes Sir Not Appearing In This Film just some dude Circe hooked up with during the timeskip, not the obvious everyman POV character, wait, no, sorry, he’s just here to set up the Black Knight movie which is probably never actually getting made, you’ll see him again in three hours, and Ajax’s death an actual wham rather than, “Oh no. Someone we don’t know is dead.” End episode 7 with the big reveal and the heel turn, and have episode 8 be the climactic confrontation and denouement.
Li
@John Campbell I actually think nonlinear storytelling would’ve worked just fine in a TV show. 🙂 But yeah, The Eternals was absolutely crying out for a TV show. IIRC it didn’t even do anything super fancy that would’ve strained a TV show’s budget. Just… Marvel’s preemptive answer to Zack Snyder’s Justice League, for some reason.
250 thoughts on “Discussion”
Dot
Awful lot of queer acts there, straight girl Jennifer. What can one say but good luck, babe?
Rose by Any other Name
Wait, they are?
I am clearly behind on my queer artists then cause the only one there I’d heard of was Minaj and I didn’t even know she was queer.
Thag Simmons
I don’t know if they meant Nicki, pretty sure she’s straight.
Yumi
Nicki Minaj is straight (years ago said she was bi, but has since walked that back), Megan Thee Stallion and Chappell Roan are queer, I think Dua Lipa is straight herself but has a large LGBTQ+ fanbase.
Thag Simmons
I mean I think Nicki is also quite popular with the gays. Honestly if you become a big popstar without amassing a large queer fanbase you’re probably doing something wrong.
That might have waned a bit for Nicki in recent years, since she’s been doing a lot of things wrong lately, but certainly during her peak years
Yumi
Yeah, it just seems Dua Lipa’s on another level from Nicki with that, where Nicki seems more at the standard pop star level.
DJTsurugi
the only thing I know about Dua Lipa, is if you scroll through her albums it’s largely just covers of other people’s music, and I only know this because of a youtube channel called FrankyFade that covers (heh) a lot of different music that’s been covered and recovered over and over again (seriously, there are no original ideas anymore) ~<3
Li
Not arguing on any of this, just musing that a lot of artists have walked back coming out as bi only to later reconfirm their identities, and to wonder what the world would look like in terms of out people if there weren’t so much prejudice.
Yumi
For Nicki Minaj specifically, she said that she had just said she was bisexual for attention– which isn’t great. But it also might be like you said, in a less prejudice world, she might position herself differently.
I’m very in favor of people discovering their identity, so that includes someone who thought they were bi and then learned they were straight (whether that’s a change in their understanding or if their sexuality changed)– and then it could change again at a later point. Just don’t love the “made it up for attention” angle.
Li
Right, but like. Is there any other denial she could have used that would have worked?
“I only pretend to be bi for male attention” also feels like something a lot of not terribly straight girls tell themselves while they drink exactly enough alcohol to plausibly deny their genuine interest in kissing other girls at parties.
I’m not absolving Hypothetical Minaj of anything here, internalized biphobia still hurts other people.
I’m just also. Skeptical that anyone has ever actually pretended to be bi “for attention”. The attention it gets you isn’t fun.
Yumi
For your first question, like… yeah? “I realized that wasn’t me,” “Was still figuring things out,” “Loved so many people in the community I thought I might be, too.” Different denials could also connect to various biphobic ideas, unfortunately, because there are a lot of them. But I do think more considerate phrasing could have been chosen. At the same time, it’s a lot to have to navigate in the public eye as part of celebrity status.
I do think people might pretend for attention– the way people will pretend a lot of things for attention. I’m actually pretty sympathetic to this because it seems to come from a place of internal struggles and not being able to figure out how to get your needs met.
Li
I keep trying to keep this from being a massive response and failing!
— I think I specifically meant what other denial would have truly convinced everyone: especially homophobic/biphobic fans, for whom the idea of wanting to be part of the community will never make sense. Doesn’t make it less shitty of her to have said, though! If anything, it would make it worse: a deeper betrayal.
— Agree to disagree. I genuinely don’t think I believe anyone ever pretends to be a marginalized identity just for attention (at least not when they’re attaching that identity to their real life instead of an online sock puppet); but it’s not exactly something we can prove one way or the other.
Minaj says she’s straight and that’s all we’ve got. Pointless to disbelieve her, and definitely doesn’t make the whole debacle any better. Either way, really, I feel sorry for her, but that sympathy doesn’t outweigh the harm she’s done to other people.
Laura
Chrysanthe Tan is non-binary and queer
Queen Anthai
Megan’s straight? Goddammit there go my infinitesimally slim chances. 🙁
Yumi
I… think she’s queer. That’s what I said in the comment you’re replying to. So… you still have a shot!
zee
Im only a fan in passing so take me with a grain of salt and anyone else feel free to correct me here, but Chapell Roan is a very queer artist that’s had a huge boost in her career the past year or two, she won a Grammy this year. She has a song called good luck babe about having a lesbian lover who is in denial and still insists on dating men, that’s so popular it plays on the radio in *my* homophobic ass country. And ik Billie is bisexual so she’s not inherently making herself miserable by dating men but it’s still an incredibly funny irony to me
Dot
Billie is bi but she’s being a repper at the moment
Shawn L.
Never mind the real artists.
What’s this “straight girl Jennifer” business? (New reader, I guess?)
Yumi
Jennifer is back into denying she’s queer. Since things ended with Ruth, basically, it seems.
eh, whatever
…what, did you start to read a webcomic ten years in? Don’t do that. Go to the beginning, binge till 4 am a few times, and then read daily. Otherwise, lots of things will never make sense.
Needfuldoer
The problem with that strategy is, when you inevitably catch back up to reality, your brain is stuck in the comic’s world and you wan to know more but you’re stuck waiting like everyone else.
NGPZ
re: alt-text,
I mean it looks okay at the very least to me? :0
really don’t see what wrong with it
Rose by Any other Name
Likewise. Panel 1 looks pretty damn good to me.
So I’m going to take it as a flex, and there’s nothin Willis can do about it but be complimented.
Thing2
Help! I’ve looked this up in lots of ways but still not sure. What does ‘a flex’ mean in this context? A boast? A ‘look I can do this’? Showing off? A bit like flexing ones muscles only in art?
Thag Simmons
Yeah, it’s showing off what you can do artistically, in this case drawing a panel from an uncommon perspective.
Needfuldoer
Pretty much, yeah.
A flex is saying “look at this difficult thing I did the hard way just because I’m capable of doing so!”
John Campbell
I’m just stuck on the little tables. I mean, seriously, I have plates bigger than those tables.
Risky
Joe’s face in panel one is something special. Zoom and enhance.
clif
A lot better than I could do without the help of sophisticated software.
Amós Batista
Willis was great in first panel. Someone who lives next to him, please, give him a hug in my name.
Sirksome
I’m really interested in Jennifer’s opinions on modern Star Wars. How does she feel about Visions?
bwooom
If we clutch it with the Studio Trigger episode we can probably get Jennifer to watch Kill La Kill, which will result in… something?
Amós Batista
She: “Uugh”
Also, she: “Look, it’s not like The Mandalorian, but…”
Nono
Haven’t most of the pop people moved to Sabrina Carpenter?
(Speaking of, after what’s felt like an eternity, David Archuleta recently released a new single and it’s felt kinda Espresso-like.)
DailyBrad
From Chappell? I wouldn’t say so, Chappell’s remained pretty relevant, especially since she just put out The Giver. Sabrina’s obviously a big deal, too, but both of them are quite current.
Steamweed
Not a fan of that sort of music, but I did enjoy watching Carpenter and Ortega in their gory video. 🙂
Dean
Yeah, that video really elevated the song.
butts
based on the current billboard hot 100, doesn’t seem like it
SailorCakes
I feel like Joyce would really like Sabrina Carpenter for some reason…..?
Charles Phipps
You can like both.
Like Katy and Taylor!
*is pelted with garbage*
AnonGrouch
Long ago in a galaxy far far away there were rad chicks with space psychic powers and space swords.
Ray Radlein
Going straight to Megan Thee Stallion would be… something for Joyce
Doctor_Who
Maybe it’s like when you want to get into horror movies so you look up what the most horrible, depraved, gory one is available because surely if you can take that you can take anything, and if you can’t that just means you dial it back a notch and try again.
Or was that just me.
Hellraiser, for the record. As an old horror pro, I can safely say that even at the time there were worse things on the shelf than Hellraiser, but none that my peers knew about.
Steamweed
The Hellraisers definitely had some impact on the goths I was adjacenting with back then.
Charles Phipps
My wife refused to watch horror movies because she assumed they’d be traumatizing. I then pointed out she read the most sadistic, violent, crazy crime fiction imaginable. True crime documentaries as well.
When she finally saw horror movies for the first time, she just laughed them off.
Kimi
I still think that a lot of horror movies depend on background sound/music and ambiance. You can make something that wouldn’t normally be scary with the right ambiance (ie: going into the bike shed on a sunny day with birds singing and everyone chatting vs on a very windy night, with a full moon and the power is out). You add something like yackety sax or fellow movie viewers laughing, and it tends to ruin any fear you might have.
I am personally not a fan of jump scares, as I just normally find them a reflex test and startling but not actually scary (I have seen some in video games that are well done, not overused and don’t feel cheap). I prefer more atmospheric horror. In general, I find stuff in real life to be more horrifying than anything a horror movie normally does. People can do horrific things to each other. A documentary on 9/11, the Holocaust, or a real life stalker is more likely to give me nightmares than a horror movie about a ghost or some other supernatural thing.
Embe13
The bbc panel show QI does an excellent and hilarious breakdown of this concept using shark footage. andit is hosted by sandi tosvig and steven fry, to great gay comics!
Opus the Poet
I lived a horror movie, I don’t need to watch another one. When I was 13 we had a shooting insurrection blow up around us as the locals tried to change their form of government from a monarchy to an Islamic republic, and the king didn’t take many prisoners, and those that were taken lost hands if they were lucky or heads if they were unlucky. And that was one of the milder horrors I went through as a child.
Embe13
I hope your life is far more peaceful, and the genre you prefer now.
Opus the Poet
I still get shot at but that’s just where I live, people get drunk and fire (mostly) pistols randomly, usually in the air, but there was a domestic violence murder less than a quarter mile away. And I have lost count of the TVs left out for trash pickup with one or more bullet holes.
But yeah the genre of story I’m in now is generally non-violent, sort of a slapstick comedy where I fall down a lot, generally when I don’t have any pants on. And I do all my own stunts.
morleuca
Cannibal Holocaust
bwooom
Maybe she needs a shock to the system?
synnerman
The “Girls in the Hood” mated to the Powerpuff Girls music video on Youtube would probably hook Joyce.
“Megan Thee Stallion but it’s The Powerpuff Girls” was uploaded 4 years ago, so I think it would be findable in universe.
ZombieKyrik
Oh Billie/Jennifer, when are you going to wise up that being into Star Wars isn’t nearly as “nerdy” as it used to be? Besides if Alice liked you back then when she knew more about you then presumably just being yourself; then dropping the mask is the way to go.
ZombieKyrik
and dropping the mask is the way to go.*
Nono
I guess at this point in the sliding timescale Star Wars has fallen kinda out of place in popular media? Not disappeared, but it’s been a while that it’s close to a generation behind.
Radiance
When this comic started, the prequel trilogy came out during Billie’s childhood. Currently, Rogue One came out during her childhood.
In a few years, we’ll get a flashback to Billie getting a stuffed Baby Yoda for her 6th birthday, and her holding it tightly in bed because her parents’ consistent absence made that the closest she could get to actually hugging them.
Thag Simmons
Last Jedi’s almost eight years old at this point and that’s the point when it became clear that Disney’s Star Wars would not be the unstoppable juggernaut that Force Awakens and Rogue One seemed to be heralding.
Honestly I could buy Jennifer having basically any opinion on the post-TLJ canon so long as it’s strong.
Sirksome
This is definitely a timescale thing. At this point Star Wars stuff is definitely mainstream. The Mandolorian and Andor both being extremely popular and award winning series even my parents have seen some of. Andor is even getting season 2 in like a month. The nerd factor is probably watching a lot of the extended stuff. Ahsoka, Acolyte, any of the animated stuff which is really the only way you’d know who Kit Fisto is.
Thag Simmons
Star Wars has always been somewhat mainstream, but I do think the D+ shows represent a slump period. Doesn’t mean it’s something obscure that only the super nerds follow, it’s still got a place in pop culture, but it’s not utterly dominant in the way that Star Wars can be in a peak period.
Charles Phipps
They did a listing of Disney+’s viewers.
Star Wars and Marvel were the entirety of the top ten viewed shows except for Percy Jackson. The Acolyte was #2
https://luminatedata.com/blog/franchise-frenzy-or-fatigue/
Sirksome
People watched Acolyte? Then why did it get cancelled?! I’m still pissed about it!
Thag Simmons
Problem with making shows that cost 230 million is that it becomes a much bigger potential loss to continue with a show that had an awkward first season and didn’t immediately light the world on fire.
Charles Phipps
Acolyte being a streaming only platform meant that it had a smaller potential audience for the amount of money being spent on it.
Jeremiah
All the reason listen above plus all streaming platforms had become a cancer on creative works.
Thag Simmons
Disney+ does not represent the entirety of pop culture.
Charles Phipps
No, but if a show ON Disney+ then it falls on Disney for not making movies instead of streaming service shows.
And the only place to watch the streaming service shows are….their streaming service.
(This isn’t a criticism, I think a major financial failure of Disney was the fact Hawkeye, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Ms. Marvel should have been movies)
Li
I’ll +1 this even though I really like them as TV shows.
Sirksome
I don’t think the problem is that they were shows. I think Disney just overestimated and oversaturated audiences with Marvel stuff because they needed content for their streaming service. People just aren’t gonna watch everything.
Li
Maybe?
But let’s suppose that a million people became Disney+ subscribers specifically to watch Falcon and the Winter Soldier or She-Hulk. Even if they only stay subscribed for a month, that’s still the equivalent of a lot of movie tickets…
But basically impossible for anyone to prove. Which makes it harder to sell executives on future projects. Which means a lot of one-season-only shows that don’t get to tell their full story. Which leads to the same self-fulfilling death spiral Netflix Originals are so often in, where people don’t want to watch them until they’re complete, and they don’t get completed because no one’s watching.
John Campbell
On the flip side, Eternals should have been a TV series. It really needed more space to world-build. As it was, it ended up being way too long and simultaneously not long enough, with a bunch of important character development being just back-filled in flashbacks.
Forget all the non-linear storytelling nonsense. Just start with the Eternals arriving on Earth, and have the first five episodes be moving forward in through (pre)history, each episode having all of the Eternals in it, but focusing on a different pair of them, to illustrate what they do and why they’re there. Have episode six be the team fracturing, ending with them breaking up and scattering across the world.
Then episode 7 could pick up where the movie started, which makes Sir Not Appearing In This Film just some dude Circe hooked up with during the timeskip, not the obvious everyman POV character, wait, no, sorry, he’s just here to set up the Black Knight movie which is probably never actually getting made, you’ll see him again in three hours, and Ajax’s death an actual wham rather than, “Oh no. Someone we don’t know is dead.” End episode 7 with the big reveal and the heel turn, and have episode 8 be the climactic confrontation and denouement.
Li
@John Campbell I actually think nonlinear storytelling would’ve worked just fine in a TV show. 🙂 But yeah, The Eternals was absolutely crying out for a TV show. IIRC it didn’t even do anything super fancy that would’ve strained a TV show’s budget. Just… Marvel’s preemptive answer to Zack Snyder’s Justice League, for some reason.
John Campbell
Oh, that reminds me, there’s a new Daredevil on.
… or two new Daredevils, apparently.
Charles Phipps
Daredevil/Amazi-Girl crossover!