"Don't Attack The Man With The Microphone."

[Shishio]

http://www.livevideo.com/video/0693546C ... s-you.aspx

[CaptainClaude]

I was there for this, it was quality.

the whole dissing match was funnier than the pilot for that Reaper show. even the story about his big dog having sex with his smaller dog was funnier than reaper. heck, being kicked in the mouth is funnier than reaper.

[[AlmightyPyro]]

That was awesome!

[Shishio]

I was there for this, it was quality.

You are a lucky bastard.

[Mr.Bob]

Is there a transcript? I can hardly hear what the first guy was asking at the beginning and what the answer was.

[Shishio]

Not that I know of, but since Ryclaude was there, I'm sure he can fill you in.

[CaptainClaude]

"when are you going to make any films outside the view askew universe that DON'T suck" is the gist of it i think.

[McDuffies]

"when are you going to make any films outside the view askew universe that DON'T suck" is the gist of it i think.

That's all wrong, it would imply that later view askew films don't suck.

[Yeahduff]

Dogma was great, and Jay & Silent Bob might've been self-indulgent crap, but it was funny.

[CaptainClaude]

"when are you going to make any films outside the view askew universe that DON'T suck" is the gist of it i think.

That's all wrong, it would imply that later view askew films don't suck.

oh come on!

it's not like mallrats was all that either!


and anyway, no it doesn't.

[Yeahduff]

Yeah, Mallrats seriously blows.

[McDuffies]

Yes, Mallrats blow and Dogma was great, and Jay and Silent Bob had about ten minutes of funny material when you put it all together... but Clerks II seem to indicate that Clerks and Dogma were just happy accidents.
Unless you like toilet humor, that is.

[CaptainClaude]

chasing amy was pretty good. And I actually liked Clerks 2 to a point.

[Levi-chan]

Aye with Chasing Amy. <3 Banksy.

Clerks II was okay, until the "Profanity + Gross-out = LAWL" formula gets tired. Say, about 10 minutes in.

[CaptainClaude]

too much danté and kevin smith's wife and sin city lady.

[Yeahduff]

Dante's, like, the main character though.

Clerks 2 wasn't gold, but it wasn't terrible. It could be that after hanging out with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, he's lost touch with 20-something slackers more than he cares to admit.

[CaptainClaude]

Dante and Randall are the main character, when you put them together they make a decent whole. They felt too broken up to me until theyy're brought back together in the ending. Dante just isn't really strong enough to carry the scenes without randall.

[Yeahduff]

Hm. I think I misunderstood you the first time. OK, I can see that.

[McDuffies]

chasing amy was pretty good.

I thought that too until I saw it again recently after a long time. Now the novelty of comic-making background and Silent Bob's monologue has wore off, it turned out to be a rather narrow, unimaginative storytelling, and a lot less understanding of human character than I thought before.

Clerks II wasn't terrible as a film itself, but as a sequel to Clerks it was absolutely dreadful. Why? Because you can see Smith rewriting old ideas from the first film, as if it won't be a good sequel if it doesn't follow the same pattern. Case in point:
1. Dante can't decide between two women.
2. Randal insults customers.
3. Obligatory scene of doing something at the roof of the store.
4. Shocking act of sexual deviacy in the end.
5. The scene where Randal pours his heart in the end and shows what's behind his mask.

etc. But he fails miserably if nothing then just because he calls us to compare it to the first film:

1. Dante can't decide between two ladies. But where in first film it was his natural indecisiveness and unability to take control of his life, in sequel it's simple, Hollywood-like he-loves-one-girl-but-doesn't-realise-it-until-the-end shit. In original, at the end of the film he still hasn't decided between the two and after the end he still continues to make the same mistakes, the point that seriously lacks from the second film with it's happy-ending. I think at some point they justified it by "characters being more mature". Lack of imagination and braveness is always justified with "more mature".
2. Randal molests customers, but this time he's not just an annoying guy from the neighbour, this time they go so over the top, full of himself and in power that one can't possibly feel sympathetic of him. In first film he was molesting people randomly, on a whim. In second, he's obviously author's voice, and molests people who represent what Smith himself finds annoying.
In first film, randal was a supporting character. In second, you feel like he's taking majority of the screen time, which is probably because Dante's material was so weak.
But basically, it boils down to "audience loved Randal! Let's give them even more Randal this time!" Heck, why not a "Randal: the movie"?
3. Been done. No reason to repeat it except that we're supposed to say "hey, I remember this from the first film".
4. While necrophillia in the first film appeared naturally from the plot, in here it's a contrieved device. It shouts at us that Smith couldn't think of anything better to end the film. It's totally unrelated to the rest of the plot, there's no point in it and it can only be labeled as "the director felt like putting it in".
5. In first film Randal was de-masked as a sort of follower of Camus' philosophy of absurd, a person who is observant of events but decides not to take part in them. In here, he goes on about friendship and feelings? It's another Hollywood cliche that says that every cool guy has to show his sensitive side sooner or later, but at that point we don't expect anything else but cliche from that film.

"Clerks II" fails because it ends up being a typical Hollywood's romantic comedy, perhaps a bit more funny than the average, at times. It's just another Hollywood movie, which is what I thought was the major disadvantage for "Jersey girl" too. Smith started his career as anything but "just another", be it "Clerks" or "Mallrats". To be brought down to making typical Hollywood now.

Btw. the whole thing with "View askew" is overblown too. It used to be just an inside joke that Smith made here and there, but then obsessive fans grabbed onto them, Smith bought the idea back and now it's supposedly his opus magnum or something. So what, if, say Brian O'Halloran walked to Ben Affleck in "Jersey girl", asked him for time and said "I wasn't supposed to even be here today", suddenly "Jersey girl" would have became a part of something greater than the sum of it's parts? And suddeny another directors started making "view askew" films and fans debating about continuity of events and arguing which film happened before which?

That's like if Claude drew a cameo of Komiyan in his comic and people started debating about in which exact point of "Darken" continuity has Komiyan visited a "Reckless youth" world.
Smith's role as a Silent Bob was equally an inside joke. This would be like if he suddenly started trying to make a dramatic-acting career based on popularity of that one novelty role.

It's completely irrelevant whether some of Smith's films are in or out of "View askew" universe. Being a part of them or not, won't make them and better or worse. That he can's make a good non-view-askew film is a consequence of him not being able to make a good film, period, and not of it's not belonging to the WA-universe.

[Shishio]

Man, I liked Clerks II, but I think reading that has made me think less of it. THANKS, MCDUFFIES.