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Author Topic: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.  (Read 1987 times)

Wntrlnd

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So I saw this article on Variety about Chris Pratts new movie "The terminal list" https://variety.com/2022/tv/news/the-terminal-list-creator-fights-woke-critics-1235337305/ which I figured might interest the members of the RPGsite.

According to the shows creator, a former Navy Seal, critics hate it because it's not "woke" enough to which he replies that while it's not woke, neither is it in any form "anti-woke" either. He just wanted to avoid putting politics into it.

I think he raises a point. Why is it impossible to just be neutral? To just make a good movie (or series) nowadays without (having to) inject politics in it.

Eirikrautha

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #1 on: August 09, 2022, 07:55:42 PM »
So I saw this article on Variety about Chris Pratts new movie "The terminal list" https://variety.com/2022/tv/news/the-terminal-list-creator-fights-woke-critics-1235337305/ which I figured might interest the members of the RPGsite.

According to the shows creator, a former Navy Seal, critics hate it because it's not "woke" enough to which he replies that while it's not woke, neither is it in any form "anti-woke" either. He just wanted to avoid putting politics into it.

I think he raises a point. Why is it impossible to just be neutral? To just make a good movie (or series) nowadays without (having to) inject politics in it.

Oh, you sweet summer child.

The very same people who mocked G.W. Bush's "If you are not for us, then you are against us" order their entire worldview around that exact principle.  Any media that is not woke is considered to be promoting the status quo (or at least ok with it), which makes it anti-woke.  So the woke have set up a Manichean dualism, where you are either an ally or an enemy.  No neutrals are allowed...

Skullking

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #2 on: August 10, 2022, 04:26:32 AM »
Because, in the eyes of Leftists, 'silence is violence'. Either you agree and are an 'ally', virtue signalling as required or you are literally (sic) a Nazi.

oggsmash

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #3 on: August 10, 2022, 05:36:43 AM »
Its not an accident all the news stories on the series are broken and broadcast on Fox news.....  The creator of the show is PLENTY political, just not in the sense of solely right and left.  He is more or less representing a newer populist view, and that IMO is worse than anything republicans have ever put forth and is far more terrifying to leftists.

Ruprecht

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #4 on: August 11, 2022, 05:14:07 PM »
The show was pretty good once it gets up and running.
Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing. ~Robert E. Howard

Reckall

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #5 on: August 15, 2022, 10:17:56 AM »
I think he raises a point. Why is it impossible to just be neutral? To just make a good movie (or series) nowadays without (having to) inject politics in it.

I remember the first prep-talk I was given when I started writing comic books professionally. Basically, it is impossible not to be "political" - as the choices that your characters make belong, unavoidably, to a world view. What one should avoid is to be "partitical" (I don't know if this word exists in English or has the same meaning of the Italian one. Basically, it means "You should not follow the ideology of a specific party, even less mention it.")

Batman doesn't kill. Recently we saw exceptions, but that's the core of his original beliefs. That's a political statement by Batman. However, "Batman", the comic book, is not "anti-death penalty". Batman "brings to justice" people that can very well end up on the chair. Also, Batman operates outside the law. Long, academical, debates over the decades still haven't decided if Batman is an anarchist (after all he resents the "forced law and order" brought by Superman) or a straight up fascist. The latter ideas, combined, would define a character that embraces "a mostly leftist ideology via anarcho-fascist methods".

If you find the above funny, that's the point. Batman, the comic book, is successful (if properly written) because everybody finds something to like in it. It isn't preachy and it doesn't actually embrace a ideology - even if Batman doesn't kill. Being political is unavoidable, being honest is a different thing.

Another example is Tom Clancy - a idol of the conservatives. His Jack Ryan was pro-expanding CIA and other intelligence agencies. He was against defunding the Army after the Soviet Union folded. He is against "what the Press has become". He thinks that a free internet is a menace for the national security. And no one writes military hardware porn like Tom Clancy.

And yet Jack Ryan was anti-abortion. He said that the actions of Muslim terrorist should not reflect the Muslim as a whole (Clancy himself said the same right after 9/11). When, as President, Ryan faces a pandemic started by a bio-attack, he imposes a lockdown even if he is clearly told that it is unconstitutional (with chapter and verse for everyone to check).

The point that Clancy openly makes is that Jack Ryan always registered himself as "independent" so to not be tied to the ideology of a specific party (something that causes chaos in the Press when Ryan becomes President ;D). Yes, Clancy's inclinations were conservative, but his main character (who is basically Clancy that idealises himself) thinks with his head. His decisions and ideals are political, you can't escape this, but Ryan follows his head, not a party. Ha stumbles and falls badly. Clancy very often even puts sane dissenting voices in his books - voices who express a motivated dissent, not a "token I disagree with the hero because I'm stupid".

Of course you can have a plot that marries more one side of the Aisle than the other. "24", "Homeland" and the like cause screeches among the woke. But these shows still succeed because a certain world view is presented as imperfect and, in many occurrences, flawed. True, at the end no one will ever say that "Homeland" is woke (The Washington Post rained fire over it ::)) Interestingly enough, it was the favored show of both Barak Obama and our Hillary...

tl;dr No, you can't have "neutrality" or be "apolitical". What you can be is to be honest in your presentation. Trying to please everybody pleases nobody. Trying to offend nobody offends everybody.
For every idiot who denounces Ayn Rand as "intellectualism" there is an excellent DM who creates a "Bioshock" adventure.

BoxCrayonTales

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #6 on: August 15, 2022, 12:13:17 PM »
I think he raises a point. Why is it impossible to just be neutral? To just make a good movie (or series) nowadays without (having to) inject politics in it.

I remember the first prep-talk I was given when I started writing comic books professionally. Basically, it is impossible not to be "political" - as the choices that your characters make belong, unavoidably, to a world view. What one should avoid is to be "partitical" (I don't know if this word exists in English or has the same meaning of the Italian one. Basically, it means "You should not follow the ideology of a specific party, even less mention it.")
The word you're looking for is "partisan." https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/partisan#Etymology_1

And yes, a lot of people criticizing wokeness forget this and it drives my inner pedant nuts. It's basically impossible not to be political, all art is political, etc but political isn't the same as partisan.

Unfortunately, the woke make a similar mistake and believe that it's impossible not to be partisan. You're either with them or against them. If you're against them, then they want you to be executed for treason on the White House lawn.

As we have seen throughout history, shouts of "kill the infidels!" is not a sign of healthy democracy. In a healthy democracy, you don't silence your political opponents by killing them. You debate and you compromise.

Lurkndog

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #7 on: August 18, 2022, 10:36:51 PM »
I'm liking it so far, 3 episodes in.

Though I gotta say, I wish Chris Pratt would do some gonzo comedy. Like something Bill Murray would have done back in the day.

I guess Guardians of the Galaxy 3 is done filming by now.


Ruprecht

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #8 on: August 18, 2022, 10:40:22 PM »
Though I gotta say, I wish Chris Pratt would do some gonzo comedy. Like something Bill Murray would have done back in the day.
I agree, there aren't enough comedic actors and its a shame when they feel the need to be serious (and feel they need to do so to get respect). Murray made his Razors Edge and got it out of his system, hopefully Pratt will return to comedy before long.
Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing. ~Robert E. Howard

Lurkndog

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #9 on: August 18, 2022, 10:59:46 PM »
Though I gotta say, I wish Chris Pratt would do some gonzo comedy. Like something Bill Murray would have done back in the day.
I agree, there aren't enough comedic actors and its a shame when they feel the need to be serious (and feel they need to do so to get respect). Murray made his Razors Edge and got it out of his system, hopefully Pratt will return to comedy before long.

Well, he's going to be in something called Cowboy Ninja Viking. I would hope that's a comedy.

Thornhammer

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #10 on: August 19, 2022, 10:41:44 PM »
I’d love to see Jon Hamm in some sort of reboot of The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Dude has comic chops. Dude has straight man chops.

Not sure who would do the Mary Tyler Moore role, and honestly don’t think such a thing would have an audience in these times, but damn if he isn’t the guy for it.

Lurkndog

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Re: Terminal List. It's not "woke" nor "anti-woke". Its just apolitical.
« Reply #11 on: September 01, 2022, 06:18:54 PM »
Well, I watched all of Terminal List, and it was a worthwhile watch.

I know there are several more books in the series where that came from, but I have trouble believing Pratt's character will be around long enough to have those adventures.