Unpopular Opinion Thread

[SpiderZilla]

I prefer films from the 80's and early 90's when movies were generally 70 to 90 minutes in runtime.

I just think a lot movies of today are just bloated with a bunch unnecessary content such as side plots, messages, and characters that eventually either go nowhere or don't pay off.

I don’t like it when a movie doesn’t entertain me for 2 hours. Why should I pay the same admission price as a 2 hour movie but get 30 fewer minutes of entertainment? I’m not saying that bloat is always better, but at least I leave the theater with the impression that the movie tried to give me my money’s worth.

[Voyager]

Nuclear weapons have been a net-positive.

[LSD Jellyfish]

Nuclear weapons have been a net-positive.

No.

[Voyager]

How many millions more would have died in wars between major powers if not for nuclear deterrence? WW3 would have already happened and destruction worse than WW2 would have been wreaked all across the world.

No nuclear weapons = untold millions dying.

Added in 6 minutes 42 seconds:
They are the SOLE undeniable reason there has been no war between major powers. The long peace.

[Spuro]

How many millions more would have died in wars between major powers if not for nuclear deterrence? WW3 would have already happened and destruction worse than WW2 would have been wreaked all across the world.

No nuclear weapons = untold millions dying.

Added in 6 minutes 42 seconds:
They are the SOLE undeniable reason there has been no war between major powers. The long peace.

Sure, but they'll also probably be responsible for humanity's extinction down the line.

I don’t like it when a movie doesn’t entertain me for 2 hours. Why should I pay the same admission price as a 2 hour movie but get 30 fewer minutes of entertainment? I’m not saying that bloat is always better, but at least I leave the theater with the impression that the movie tried to give me my money’s worth.

I don't understand this argument. You see the same mentality among gamers and I've never understood it. Quality trumps quantity, every time. Especially when we're discussing about watching movies (or playing games) at home, rather than in the theater: how most people view their movies. A lot of us don't have the spare time to watch super long movies in one sitting, or play through an overly long, grindy video game, and so the shorter experience appeals to us more.

[Demon Lord Gira]

The other thing to remember with movies is that theater chains can be extremely fussy about how long a movie has to be. Unless you are an MCU movie or LOTR, theaters have no patience for movies approaching 3+ hours. That cuts into their revenue since it means less showings, thus less profits being made. For audience members, it's like KK said: Some of us don't have the time to watch a 2 hour movie, but a shorter one at an hour and a half, or an hour and 40 minutes might be easier to squeeze into the schedule. It also means that, a movie designed to be shorter has to be more concise, less fluff and more streamlined, which on paper can lead to a better experience than a movie bogged down with too much crammed in. Of course, that's assuming the movie is made with said shorter run time in mind. Far too often, you get directors going far too huge with their movies, then the theater chains and executives look at the 3+ hour behemoth they made, balk at it, and demand over 40+ minutes be cut from it, resulting in a movie that is still overstuffed but now suffers from horrendous pacing because none of those things are given the proper development or time they need. Movies like KOTM or Transformers: The Last Knight are key examples of this, where there's so damn much crammed into the movie but due to a lot being cut out it just makes the pacing and everything that much worse.

[Voyager]

What even happened lol my quotes kept messing up

Added in 1 minute 26 seconds:

How many millions more would have died in wars between major powers if not for nuclear deterrence? WW3 would have already happened and destruction worse than WW2 would have been wreaked all across the world.

No nuclear weapons = untold millions dying.

Added in 6 minutes 42 seconds:
They are the SOLE undeniable reason there has been no war between major powers. The long peace.

Sure, but they'll also probably be responsible for humanity's extinction down the line.

Cooler heads will prevail, we’re smarter than we seem.

[SpiderZilla]

I don’t like it when a movie doesn’t entertain me for 2 hours. Why should I pay the same admission price as a 2 hour movie but get 30 fewer minutes of entertainment? I’m not saying that bloat is always better, but at least I leave the theater with the impression that the movie tried to give me my money’s worth.

I don't understand this argument. You see the same mentality among gamers and I've never understood it. Quality trumps quantity, every time.

Every time? You wouldn’t be annoyed if you had paid full price for a movie which ended after 75 minutes? How about 45 minutes? Everyone has an expectation for how much entertainment they should receive for the price of a movie ticket. My expectation is 2 hours.

A similar mentality applies to Blu-ray purchases. Many people expect bonus features whether they be commentary tracks, bloopers, or behind-the-scenes footage, and when they don’t get anything they think less of their purchase.

[MechaGoji Bro7503]

There's more to politics than just nukes seemingly being this "positive" force. I mean, look at how the Cold War went, other conflicts became proxy wars between the US & Soviets for example. Vietnam?

Or like, being fearful of other counties possessing and creating nukes isn't necessarily a good feeling for anyone. Some overall peace? I suppose, sure. But I can't shake the feeling of all these nukes being like another powder keg waiting for some bs to light everything. Not to mention they are way stronger than the bombs used in WWII. The Cold War essentially began the moment WWII ended.

I mean, what would Dr. Yamane say, thanks for making a new Godzilla raid again and again

[Demon Lord Gira]

I don’t like it when a movie doesn’t entertain me for 2 hours. Why should I pay the same admission price as a 2 hour movie but get 30 fewer minutes of entertainment? I’m not saying that bloat is always better, but at least I leave the theater with the impression that the movie tried to give me my money’s worth.

I don't understand this argument. You see the same mentality among gamers and I've never understood it. Quality trumps quantity, every time.

Every time? You wouldn’t be annoyed if you had paid full price for a movie which ended after 75 minutes? How about 45 minutes? Everyone has an expectation for how much entertainment they should receive for the price of a movie ticket. My expectation is 2 hours.

A similar mentality applies to Blu-ray purchases. Many people expect bonus features whether they be commentary tracks, bloopers, or behind-the-scenes footage, and when they don’t get anything they think less of their purchase.

Just as a curiosity, what theatrical movies are you watching that are 45-75 minutes long? Usually theatrical movies are 90 minutes at least... And all you need to do is a quick google search to see the run time of a movie you are going to watch. Don't like how short it is? Just skip and look for something longer. You shouldn't be getting blindsided by movie runtimes...

[Spuro]

I don’t like it when a movie doesn’t entertain me for 2 hours. Why should I pay the same admission price as a 2 hour movie but get 30 fewer minutes of entertainment? I’m not saying that bloat is always better, but at least I leave the theater with the impression that the movie tried to give me my money’s worth.

I don't understand this argument. You see the same mentality among gamers and I've never understood it. Quality trumps quantity, every time.

Every time? You wouldn’t be annoyed if you had paid full price for a movie which ended after 75 minutes? How about 45 minutes? Everyone has an expectation for how much entertainment they should receive for the price of a movie ticket. My expectation is 2 hours.

Looking at my letterboxd, the latest theatrically released movie I've seen under that's 75 minutes was from the late 80s. So it's not something we need to deal with in the modern age.

And even if it were... my favorite silent film is 45 minutes, and it's incredible. Likewise, the best video game I ever played had a 2 hour runtime. In that case I absolutely advocate for quality.

[Voyager]

There's more to politics than just nukes seemingly being this "positive" force. I mean, look at how the Cold War went, other conflicts became proxy wars between the US & Soviets for example. Vietnam?

Preferable to world wide annihilation

Added in 1 minute 9 seconds:
Never really understood the hate for Dark Chocolate. I don’t taste anything substantially different from Milk Chocolate.

[SpiderZilla]

I don't understand this argument. You see the same mentality among gamers and I've never understood it. Quality trumps quantity, every time.

Every time? You wouldn’t be annoyed if you had paid full price for a movie which ended after 75 minutes? How about 45 minutes? Everyone has an expectation for how much entertainment they should receive for the price of a movie ticket. My expectation is 2 hours.

Looking at my letterboxd, the latest theatrically released movie I've seen under that's 75 minutes was from the late 80s. So it's not something we need to deal with in the modern age.

And even if it were... my favorite silent film is 45 minutes, and it's incredible. Likewise, the best video game I ever played had a 2 hour runtime. In that case I absolutely advocate for quality.

If studios no longer release movies that are under 75 minutes, doesn’t that mean they recognize that modern audiences expect longer movies for the price they pay?

[LSD Jellyfish]

I'm not sure what's being stated here. On one hand you're saying that movies should arbitrarily be a certain length to make it "worth it" (at least two hours), but then awknowledging that most movies in theaters are no longer exceptionally short (sub 80 minutes).

I'm not even sure if this is a real situation that can happen in this modern age of filmaking. As mentioned, runtimes are very easily accessible, and streaming exists. If something doesn't feel "worth it" to you personally, that's fine, but it's hard to apply such broad brushstrokes to these concepts. I'd be more pissed off at a long movie that I paid to see, that turned out to be bad, then a bad movie that I paid for around the same price, because it means I didn't only waste my money, but also my time, something that's pretty valuable to me at this stage in my life.

One thing I've learned to appreciate recently, is short form content. Although I can very easily engage with month-long adventures into books, games, and other media, short form media, be it short-films, or short stories, are woefully underated. I spend a good amount of time these days reading (and writing) short stories that are only 1-10 pages long. Longer doesn't always equare to more value.

[Legion1979]

Cooler heads will prevail, we’re smarter than we seem.

No we're not. We're really, really not. The past 7 years have proven that.

[JAGzilla]

Cooler heads will prevail, we’re smarter than we seem.

No we're not. We're really, really not. The past 7 years have proven that.

And yet, here we are. We've been suicidally stupid for about three million years, now, but eight billion of us are still somehow getting by.

[SpiderZilla]

I'm not sure what's being stated here. On one hand you're saying that movies should arbitrarily be a certain length to make it "worth it" (at least two hours), but then awknowledging that most movies in theaters are no longer exceptionally short (sub 80 minutes).

The point being debated is whether movie-going audiences expect their movies to be longer so that they feel they got their money’s worth or whether they prefer shorter movies without time-wasting subplots. I prefer the former and I think the fact that runtimes have gotten longer indicates that studios are responding to audiences’ expectations.

I'm not even sure if this is a real situation that can happen in this modern age of filmaking. As mentioned, runtimes are very easily accessible, and streaming exists. If something doesn't feel "worth it" to you personally, that's fine, but it's hard to apply such broad brushstrokes to these concepts.

A bad movie is never worth anyone’s time or money. However, I don’t know anyone who looks up runtimes before choosing which movie they will go see in a theater. The conversations generally focus on the trailer, the actors, reviews (either from the media or friends), maybe the rating, and/or what time the movie starts. We assume the movie will run around 2 hours and plan the rest of the evening around that. If those expectations are met and we enjoyed the movie, we are satisfied. But no one I know has ever expressed the opinion that a subplot should have been eliminated so that we could have left the theater sooner.

I'd be more pissed off at a long movie that I paid to see, that turned out to be bad, then a bad movie that I paid for around the same price, because it means I didn't only waste my money, but also my time, something that's pretty valuable to me at this stage in my life.

I’m not defending bad movies. This is about good movies which pad out their runtimes with “a bunch [of] unnecessary content such as side plots, messages, and characters that eventually either go nowhere or don't pay off” per the original comment that I replied to. If I’m going to enjoy the movie either way, I’ll be happier having gotten the extra entertainment for the same price as without.

Just out of curiosity, do you own the Extended Edition of any movie that you saw in a theater? If a theater was showing both it and the original theatrical release for the same price, which would you pay to see?

[Possible duplicate post. Can’t find the original]

[JAGzilla]

A bad movie is never worth anyone’s time or money.

I paid for Pacific Rim: Uprising both in theaters and on 4K, and sunk in the time to watch it twice. Are you saying I've been cheated? I can't believe it... I always thought I had enough situational awareness to catch this kind of thing... oh, God...

[SpiderZilla]

A bad movie is never worth anyone’s time or money.

I paid for Pacific Rim: Uprising both in theaters and on 4K, and sunk in the time to watch it twice. Are you saying I've been cheated? I can't believe it... I always thought I had enough situational awareness to catch this kind of thing... oh, God...

I don’t think “bad movie” means what you think it means.

[Jetty_Jags]

In talking about watching the extended edition or the theatrical depends on the film, some (many) directors cuts are worse or at least significantly different from the theatrical release. There are the exceptions of course, but many times extra scenes mess with the flow of the film, and I would say are better off not included. The go to example of obtrusive side plots (albeit in a theatrical cut) is the casino sequence in the last Jedi. Many found this sequence to be obnoxious and distracting. If this could be cut out while preserving the climax’s narrative (it really can’t but that’s not important to the conversation), i expect more people would have a more positive opinion of the film (also not touching other issues). But let’s use another example, the cut joker cameo in Batman, sure everyone loved it online but it was the right decision not to include it, it’s a recap of other pivotal scenes in the movie, messes with the flow, and doesn’t really show anything new. So yes, there are certainly people who would opt to see the shorter version for the same price if they have reason to believe the extra content is just filler.