faceh
6hr ago
I'm willing to believe that the technological gap wasn't as notable prior to 2005.
But then I read accounts of Operation Desert Storm absolutely stomping the Iraqis in Kuwait, and then the invasion of Iraq proper ALSO stomping their conventional military.
And my conclusion is that the U.S. has, since the Cold War, always had the logistical capacity to bring overwhelming force to bear on any country with an ocean view. And air supremacy to ensure we can get in and out quickly and with minimal casualties, absolutely NO need to have permanent presence.
The decision to engage in protracted occupation and nation-building, therefore, was absolutely an intentional one and the ill-defined goals of such an endeavor, as opposed to "kill off opposing leadership until somebody accepts surrender", were tailor made for creating an expensive quagmire.
I'm extremely curious to see what types of movies get made about these campaigns. There's really no way to couch them than utterly triumphant for the U.S.
I think I can go on record to say that I bet the U.S. has the capability to kill Vladmir Putin at almost any time if they committed the same degree of planning to it, but the nuclear deterrent is the only thing that would ALWAYS shift the risk calculus against such a move.
China remains a question... but I suspect the apparent failure of the Chinese-made anti-air/anti-steal radars is a wake up call for THEM too.
Point being, the U.S. military is unquestionably the apex predator of the planet, but much of its doctrine for a long time required that this never be made explicit.
No more.
It really does feel like the late-game stages of a Civ IV game where your economic and tech tree advantages have snowballed, so you can roll a doomstack of advanced military units up to any city on the map you want and take it out in a single turn.
And maybe, similar to Civ, the only thing that might stop such a power is if the other players can all agree on cooperation against that player and launch coordinated efforts to rein them in before they achieve space victory.
Which is functionally impossible in the real world.
And yes, I think Cuba goes splat later this year.
More to the point, it really makes you think that the whole problem of the last twenty years was leaders who were aware of U.S. dominance but had other goals in mind, probably including enrichment of cronies, that depended on the U.S. sandbagging hard. And arguably this is just the U.S. being let off the leash. We haven't even removed the leg weights yet.
"Soft Power" has an abysmal record, methinks. I do think Trump prefers the carrot to the stick, but the stick gets results.
I would agree, and quite a bit of the issues are editing more than anything.
One thing the first film thrives on is efficiency. Most sequences are short, aside from two major action set pieces. The highway chase/fight in Revolutions AND the burly brawl are too long, and aren't really serving the story in the way the subway fight does in the first one.
Lot of fun ideas at play though. The films at least had somewhere to go after the sequel hook from the first.
faceh
16hr ago
lol.
Sort of makes the point, though, doesn't it?
If you have an actually interesting idea for an existing franchise... maybe its better for everyone if you mold it into its own thing, first, so it doesn't carry baggage from said existing franchise that might weigh it down.
Me, I don't know how to tell when its sensible to take a new idea on an existing series and add it to the canon, vs. create a new, wholly unrelated work so it stands on its own.
I just know that more series than not end up wearing out their welcome when they go that route.
faceh
17hr ago
Another reason might be a bit more mundane. The Terminator made the most of its limited budget, but some of its visual effects looked pretty ropey even at the time. Half of the appeal of Terminator 2 was getting to see a story very similar to the original (indeed, the plot beats and structure are so similar that in some ways it's more like a remake than a sequel), but with an expanded budget and VFX wizardry.
See also the Matrix Trilogy.
They did their damndest to keep the visuals impressive and upping the ante thanks to unlimited budget. And sort of succeeded but also sucked the actual heart and soul out in the process.
It takes a lot of skill to create tension, in general.
T1 there was the whole "this is an implacable, nigh-invulnerable killing machine that is programmed to kill YOU, specifically. And your only defense is a squishy standard human."
T2 had that, PLUS the target was a child, who now had to befriend his own implacable, nigh-invulnerable killing machine.
Repeating the formula starts to break that tension, even if you ostensibly escalate with a bigger, badder robot. Harder to manipulate audience expectations.
Similar with Predator. You can keep iterating "now they're in the 1700s. Now they're in Japan. Now its an alien planet and there's 10 preds." But how do you get audiences to buy in a third, fourth, fifth time?
And the Alien series. "Oh man one of these things was terrifying. How about HUNDREDS of them?"
Where to do you go from there without being derivative?
I think this has also hurt the John Wick films. By the third, we know he's going to be pull his suit up to cover his head and will never take a serious wound during an action sequence.
By 4 he's surviving MULTIPLE 30 foot drops.
Its still great action, I still like the films, but the appeal in the first was that he did seem vulnerable.
Its should, I think, sometimes be easy to say that you can capture "lightning in a bottle" only 2-3 times and unless you're a generational talent at filmmaking, things will inherently get formulaic if you keep trying to recreate that success.
Glad that @TitaniumButterfly post made it in, it didn't get enough attention at the time.
Some guys (hell, myself included) could do for printing that out on a poster and using it as a mantra.
faceh
18hr ago
The single greatest compliment I've ever heard a wife pay to a husband was "casual omnicompetence."
i.e. she considers him capable of addressing literally ANY problem. He has the toolset, the mindset, and the physical capacity to unfuck anything. And not just mechanical issues either.
And from her perspective, he does so while barely breaking a sweat. Though he will tell you, outside of her earshot, that sometimes it really does irritate him and/or stress him out to have to keep doing this.
But he knows he's appreciated, so that hardly matters.
faceh
18hr ago
I've wondered about REALLY cheating, Get some convincing fake tattoos, ride a motorcycle but ONLY on safe, low speed roads, swig water from a flask, go gambling but only use optimal betting strategy... etc.
Just mimic every single "bad boy" signal without the element that makes them actually dangerous.
But if you're shooting for a long-lasting relationship, probably not good to found it upon a lie. Unless you're willing to then become that guy as the relationship progresses, at which point just go all in at the start.
faceh
18hr ago
This girl had intentions of being an EMT (she was pre-med in high school, just as I was pre-law).
On net, her premature death may mean more people have died than otherwise would have had she been there to help them.
And yeah, donorcycles are terrifying in an existential way. Careening down a highway at 70+ mph with only a thin layer of leather and (if you're not dumb) an armored helmet all you have to protect you from the 10 ton metal boxes that are ALSO zooming around at 70 mph.
Because I intend to live a long time you will never catch me on a motorcycle.
"UNFORTUNATELY" girls tend to be attracted to risk-takers/bad boys, so I've also pointed out that Motorcycles and Tattoos are indeed a cheat code for getting a woman attracted to you.
But my rational brain simply cannot accept that tradeoff.
"Nontrivial chance of death, dismemberment, or permanent disfigurement/paralysis... vs. a +2 modifier to my charisma and +50% modifier any time I flirt with a girl with a tongue piercing and 3 STIs."
Its BECAUSE these things signal bad decision making (well, call it 'lack of fear') that women hone in on them when they're in a certain kind of way.
And it must work because no matter how often these guys manage to remove themselves from the gene pool, their DNA persists.
That said, some of the most ardent bikers are know are single and have no kids (or grown children) so it really is their life to lose. And seem to have a fatalistic acceptance of the risk.
faceh
19hr ago
Phew.
We broke up first semester of college.
I didn't take that well, but eventually got over it, and made some efforts to reconcile. We were back in contact and generally on good terms by Junior year.
Then, Senior year, her boyfriend was teaching her to ride a motorcycle (sans helmet) and she lost control and slammed into a stairwell, spent a little bit of time braid-dead in ICU before the plug was pulled.
I sometimes think about that guy and have to assume he's got even more trauma from it than I do. And I was fucked up about it for almost a year and a half.
The indelible mark it left on my personality is that I refuse to leave any relationship I actually care about on a bad note. Even if we had a knockdown drag out argument, I will come back around to make sure the last words we exchanged were in some way positive.
Like, the horror of thinking that the last interaction I had with someone might have been negative and painful... and then they unexpectedly DIE leaving that as the last remaining memory of the friendship, it would kill me. I cherish the memories I have of that girl and I'm so glad that I did in fact attempt to patch things up.
Even though I now know that many people don't really care that much, and I'm just like twice as empathetic as the average person... I still think its the right way to go through life.
I mean... if a geopoltical foe demonstrates the ability to bypass your entire defense grid and either abduct or atomize you at any time... do you have any CHOICE but to accept their terms?
That's what seems new. No protacted invasion, no insurgency period, just a chopper full of spec ops on your roof, or a missile through your window. Most of this conducted from the sky.
Only completely decentralized organization, similar the Taliban, could expect to withstand this particular approach. If your leadership is forced hid in a maximum security fortress at all times just to function, are they even 'sovereign' over their own nation?
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