Sunday 7 January 2018

The Thomas Fanbase Shits Itself Again

Another day, another example of whiny little brats getting pissy over opinions. And this could be their most disgusting little stunt so far.

For context, some fans wrote and produced a shitty little fanfic for YouTube: Journey Beyond Sodor: How It Should Have Been. Now I was going to write this narcissistic piece of garbage off as soon as I’d heard about it. Partly due to the narcissistic title, partly due to the fact that past experiences taught me that most fans can’t write a story to save their lives. But, in order to properly have an opinion on it, I bit the bullet and decided to watch it, tweeting my reactions as I did so.

45 seconds in, the destruction began:
I won’t embed all the tweets as there’s so many of them, so I’ll sum up all the problems here:
  • It panders to fans to the point of obnoxiousness (and even then, half of the references are wrong or pointless),
  • Their idea of an “in character” James is an egotistical racist,
  • Gordon ends up becoming a discount James, only he’s discriminatory to other characters,
  • The story constantly contradicts itself,
  • There are so many plot conveniences,
  • The plot itself falls apart after 5 minutes or so,
  • You don’t really care that James is captured because you can’t root for him,
  • It’s completely hypocritical (it’s made as a “fuck you” to Mattel, yet uses so many Mattel era tropes and words),
  • Oliver’s “character” is reduced to “Remember Escape!?”,
  • The realism the film aims for works against the plot constantly,
  • Other characters are severely underused,
  • The songs (and singing) are shit,
  • The sound editing is really bad,
  • There are basic continuity errors between shots,
  • The lack of respect for British terminology and railways is pathetic for a film that says “we’re respecting the Thomas universe”,
  • The themes are atrocious,
  • The pacing is terrible,
  • The film, overall, feels like Sudrian propaganda.
The only counter arguments I’ve seen so far are “the visuals are really good” which simply isn’t true. They’re passable at best, but the blatantly obvious use of green screen for tracking shots look bad. Especially when they’re used to have the engines travel on roads instead of rails.

The other one is “but they spent so long on it”... as though that matters for any reason. Here’s a little reality check for those fans: quality isn’t defined by the amount of time put in, but by the amount of effort put in in that timeframe! With its script that seemed like a first draft, music and sound design that seemed orchestrated in around half an hour and visuals that were hastily cobbled together, this felt like a rush job.

But that’s the thing: every time any two bit hacks throw together a project and release them to the public, they feel as though they deserve praise solely for making something, regardless of quality. And they, and their sycophants, will come up with any excuse to give them that praise when, more often than not, they don’t deserve it at all. And when they don’t get it, they turn into the whiny, screeching manchildren they truly are. Case in point, this thread (I'll embed the first tweet here, feel free to scroll through it in your own time):
How sad and pathetic must your life be to attack a disabled person solely for being disabled? Solely because they had the sheer gall to say a shit film was shit? Solely because one opinion doesn't march in lockstep with theirs? These scumbags are the lowest of the low, and they do it for two reasons:
  1. They can’t think of a good counter argument as to why it’s good, so they just go on the attack.
  2. Their lives are so empty and meaningless that they’d rather tear someone who’s happy and confident down to try and force them to change their minds.
Here’s a newsflash for those fuckwits: I’m not changing my mind until you give me a good reason as to why it’s good. Insulting me will only make me hate it even more, and will result in further exposes with regards to your shitty behaviour in the future. Because I’m done sitting back and taking it. I’m done ignoring it. Last year proved that, and I will continue to call you out this year. Because your behaviour is unacceptable and you’ve been getting away with it for far too long.

EDIT: Since publishing this post, the fanbase has stooped even further, implying homosexuality is a mental problem akin to autism.

Seriously, fuck this fanbase. Hard. All of this bullshit was because someone actually bothered to treat a piece of art like a piece of art and be critical of it. If you're a content creator that can't handle criticism, stop being a content creator.

10 comments:

  1. Now I'm scared to make my own rewrite of a special...

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    Replies
    1. Don’t be. Just do the exact opposite of what they did and you’ll be fine. Focus on the story and the rest will take care of itself.

      Delete
    2. Alright...

      Is there anymore advise you can give me?

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    3. - Always proofread after the first draft is done. Ask someone else to read it as well if needs be (you can get some good insight if you do).
      - Don’t overload on references. One or two that are plot relevant are fine, but stick with that.
      - Don’t limit yourself with regard to the subject matter. But do as much research as you can if you’re focusing on something that’s new to you.

      Delete
    4. Okay, thanks very much.

      If I ever decide to do a remake (more like an audio drama) of a Thomas special, I'll come to you for help on it.

      Delete
  2. People are pathetic sometimes...

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  3. Yeah, I’ve recently been calling out people for running the BWBA jokes and rants into the ground, particularly the ones by Nichole Williams, but guess what?

    I’m called out as the f**king bad guy! So let me get this straight, just because I don’t hold any real hostility towards BWBA or the characters, Nia and Rebecca, I’m apparently a secret SJW?

    Like...what? I agree with you that the fandom in 2017 was absolutely atrocious and I have a feeling it’s going to be even worse this year.

    I’m sick of hearing the same argument about BWBA, Nia and Rebecca or the changes that have happened to the show. At this point, I don’t care what happens in the series nowadays as I need something to keep me entertained and to keep up with the Thomas franchise. I’m not saying anything wrong about the episodes/specials we’ve gotten since 2013, I’m just at a point where I’m expecting changes to happen. The show has gone through several changes over the course that it’s been relevant that the changes just don’t affect me all that much.

    It’s pretty obvious that originality is being lost these days and that shows and franchises have to steal ideas from each other to remain in competition.

    I’m still going to watch BWBA and Season 22 regardless, as well as reserve judgement on the characters Nia and Rebecca until the final product is released.

    And for those fans that think that Edward, Henry, Toby and the rest of the secondary cast are going to be removed from the series:

    WAKE THE F**K UP!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I just think it's laughably pathetic that these people throw around buzzwords like "SJW" in a negative context just to try and shut people up. Yep, how dare some people care about others? Especially those that have been persecuted against (actual persecution, not the faux persecution they think exists against them)? The most ridiculous part is that most of these people are autistic. They have been been constantly derided and demeaned by society. Yet rather than show them they're wrong, they live up to the stereotypes and prove the world right. They constantly talk about "maturity", and how we're "triggered" by so much, yet they're the ones with their fingers constantly on said trigger of a proverbial loaded gun.

      With regards to BWBA, I've been highly critical myself, but I'm more bothered by the cynical business reasons behind it rather than the actual decision itself. And I'm definitely not screaming "racism" (or using racist language) with regards to Nia. A character we literally know nothing about yet!

      That said, none of this surprises me since a poll stated that half of those polled are Conservatives, who've always shown they like things "just so" and love getting angry when attention isn't on them. Then they feign persecution, throw around derogatory, bigoted language then say we're the "triggered" ones when we fight back.

      They say we're "soft snowflakes" when the world can't be bothered to move with the times and realise that the minorities they demean are human beings, not animals. But every time the world wakes up and gives those minorities the rights they deserve, conservatives constantly prove they have skin like tissue paper.

      Delete
  4. Gee Chris. I had no idea about any of this.

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    Replies
    1. It’s why I shine a light on it. Otherwise people won’t know and it’ll get swept under the rug. The only way to make the fanbase better is to out the toxicity publicly. It’s also why so many fans hate SIF; they don’t tolerate rule breakages and the worst fans hate following rules.

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