Critics Can Suck My Balls.

I realized something today.

I really hate critics.

First of all, being a critic has to be the most useless, pointless job in the universe. Let me give you an example of why:

Last night, Sunny and I were watching a movie, and when it went off I felt like tracking down the writers and demanding back the two hours of my life that they’d just stolen. In my opinion, that movie was nothing but a long, drawn out yawn-fest with an ultra predictable plot and terrible acting.

Here’s the twist though, Sunny actually liked it. She thought it was good. I’m not saying she’s wrong and I’m right…I’m pointing this out to highlight one thing:

Two people (with an awful lot in common), can watch the same movie at the same time…and come to two entirely different opinions about the movie.

So what does this actually tell us?

It tells us that critics have a pointless job. I’ve watched movies that have been absolutely panned by critics and thought they where awesome. I’ve watched movies that critics have been creaming their jeans over and left fifty IQ points lower because my brain cells started committing suicide.

How many times has someone told you a show is awesome and it’s bored you to tears? How many times has someone told you a movies is terrible and you’ve watched it and really enjoyed it?

Entertainment, whether it’s a TV show, movie or restaurant to eat at is completely and totally subjective. That some random guy who works at a newspaper says something is good or bad doesn’t actually matter.

Sure, I’ve ‘reviewed’ things here, but normally that’s because I think something’s so good or so bad I just want to write about it. Unlike ‘professional’ critics, I don’t believe that my opinion is actually more important that anyone else’s. I haven’t surrounded myself in self-important delusions of grandeur, a belief that just because I can write a review my opinion is worth more than other people’s.

That’s what actually makes me hate critics. They’re just so damn smug and self-satisfied about it. Half the time you read a reviews are written, not to actually review something, but so the critic can show off how witty and intelligent he is.

Let me give you an example. Let’s look at an excerpt of a review of ‘Firefly’ by Tim Goodman of the San Francisco Chronicle:

“(Firefly is) a forced hodgepodge of two alarmingly opposite genres just for the sake of being different… To call "Firefly" a vast disappointment is an understatement. Whedon has proven he's capable of brilliance, but this is mere folly."

Oh really, Mr. Goodman? That’s your ‘professional’ opinion is it?

The weird thing is I seem to recall a very popular Sci-Fi movie being just filled with Wild West references. What was it called again?

Oh yeah, Star Wars. The most popular Sci-Fi movie of all time.

My memory might be a little fuzzy, but I seem to remember a swash-buckling gunslinger called Han Solo having a shootout in a Cantina. Oh, and where was that scene set? That’s right, Mos Eisley, an almost clichéd frontier-style desert town.

Yeah, Western and Sci-Fi really are alarmingly different. I mean, you couldn’t possibly draw a link between between a group of people exploring the frontier of space and the wagon trains exploring the frontier of the old west. Colonists on a brand new planet couldn’t possibly have anything in common with old-west settlers. A mostly unexplored sector of space filled with roaming bands of hostile Reavers doesn’t remind me at all of those Wild West movies where settlers traveled across deserts under constant fear of attack from Indians.

You, sir, are an idiot who has no understanding that ‘theme’ has absolutely nothing to do with setting. For example, Star Wars, as well as it’s Western Themes, also mixed classic fantasy, mythical themes and, of all things, classic fairy-tales with Sci-Fi. Did you see Star Wars and decide you couldn’t have magic and a classical ‘Hero’s Journey’ in Sci-Fi as well?

Well, I decided to end this post by doing something a little different. I’m going to review Tim Goodman’s review. Let’s see how he likes it…the dumb son of a bitch:

“Tim Goodman’s review shows nothing but a total lack of understanding of the genres he claims to be an authority in. He appears to be working under the assumption that because Westerns are set in the past and Sci-Fi is set in the future, that this automatically makes them mutually incompatible. With such a narrow minded view, it’s not surprising that he hasn’t realized that Western themes are almost a staple of modern Sci-Fi, most notably the ‘Lone Sheriff’ surrounded by ‘Outlaws’ and the idea of a lawless, mostly unexplored frontier.

In a crude attempt to hide his ignorance, Goodman made the poor choice of littering his review with five-dollar words like ‘Hodgepodge’ and ‘Genre’, an extremely poorly thought out and transparent attempt to seem intelligent. He obviously believes his regular trips to the thesaurus will hide his ignorance, but it really serves only to highlight it. His review is the equivalent of a two dollar painting in a thousand dollar frame. Nicely dressed but ultimately worthless. In fact, the way in which he’ dismisses’ Firefly as ‘mere folly’ is so self-satisfied and smug that it is almost masturbatory. You can almost sense him patting himself on the back as he wrote it.

In closing, thanks to his unqualified, self-aggrandizing manner, Tim Goodman is the reason that our TV Networks throw out innovative and entertaining programming in favor of carbon-copy reality shows. Considering Goodman and critics like him appear to spend more time thinking about ways to justify their pointless, worthless jobs instead of actually learning about the things they’re supposed to review, this is hardly surprising.

His reviews should be avoided as they are merely the ramblings of a willfully ignorant self-important man with no real value or worth.”

Paulius – Life, What The Hell Is Going On.