Slaughtering Sacred Cows of Entertainment

Cafe Society
1

What movie, book, author, or television series is usually held up as a model of excellence do you dislike or hate? Do you consider the collected works of J.R.R. Tolkien to be nothing more than a poor pastiche of plagarised Trutonic mythology? Is Star Wars a mildly entertaining space opera at best? Spielberg a hack? Jimmy Stewart the most overrated actor to ever work in Hollywood?

Try not to be too harsh in your slaughter but I’m curious. What entertainers and/or pieces of entertainment have you never gotten the appeal of or not considered worth your time but is considered by the majority or plurality to be the best of its field?

2

I couldn’t possibly be more indifferent as to which hairy unwashed person did or said what on any episode of Suvivor ever filmed. Does that count?

Also all of what little I have heard from the vocalists on American Idol makes me want to jam knitting needles forcibly into my eardrums.

3

I suppose those would count but I was looking more for “This Critically AND Popularly Acclaimed ______ Sucks” than “Current Pop Culture Sucks”.

We have a ton of threads trashing *Friends *and reality TV but not so many where people deflate overrated works.

4

Made it through 15 minutes of **Citizen Kane[/b[ before flipping the channel, wondering what people see in it now (as opposed to judging its impact on the medium, which I’ll take on faith was highly influential).

Listening to film students talk about Friz Lang’s Metropolis is infinitely more entertaining than watching the actual movie.

5

Garden State bored me to death.

The Dark Knight Returns, one of the most acclaimed comic stories of all times, is just not that good. I think Batman: Year One is far superior.

Jack Nicholson and Robert DeNiro have been coasting on reputation, basically doing impressions of themselves for years.

That felt good :slight_smile:

6

Four posts in and I already regret starting this thread.

7

Lord of the Rings is an interesting story and mytholology, with interesting characters.

But Tolkien couldn’t WRITE the story to save his life.

Story: Good. Style: Ohmygodmangetonwithit!

As a comic book fan, I appreciate Jack Kirby’s contributions to the medium. He was, I admit, a great.

But good lord a-mighty, his art is ugly.

8

Having recently laughed, groaned and WTFed my way through Vertigo I have to wonder why anyone could gush over it with a straight face.

9

Much as I love Hitchcock, I do agree Vertigo is overrated. I much prefer Strangers on a Train, North by Northwest and Psycho.

10

???

11

Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewere and die.

Or, in other words, you slaughtered one of my sacred cows. No fair.

12

West Side Story. Does anybody actually buy this dreck?

13

Sorry, I just watched it last night, so it was fresh in my mind :smack: :stuck_out_tongue:

Back to the thread, Sex And The City was about as clever as According To Jim (not a good thing), but it had racy language and occasional nudity.

I realize I’m in the minority here, but I never thought Seinfeld was especially funny, certainly not worth the fawning it recieved.

14

Gotcha beat, never watched them.
:slight_smile:

Cop shows. Doctor shows. Hate the damn things. Shows about assholes.

Battlestar Ponderosa.

Andromeda began to fellate with great allacrity when Sorbo began running things. His ambition in life is to have a job on a soap oper so he won’t have to work. Getting rid of Tyr, the most interesting character killed it for me.

15

Aesiron, now just where did you get the idea for this thread… hmm, enquiring Trekkies wanna know.
Watch the board, I’m getting readyto start one based on a conversation over there as well.

Anyway, slaughtering sacred cows.

–Barbra Streisand’s C over High C or whatever the fuck it is is so Goddamn overrated, I can’t look at or listen to her. Drivelshit, I call her vocalizing!

–Seinfeld is annoying in the most grating fucking way, especially the doofus with the 60s shirts and Lyle Lovett hair.

–Most horror prose and films are not horrifying, just boring.

–Gore Vidal can write better than most people alive or dead. Other times he can be pedantic (why does he even bicker with Chuck Heston over the gay subtext in “Ben Hur”–Vidal always comes off looking like a sniveling whiner, even when he is right, and he is right, the subtext is louder than a Hawaiian shirt).

Sir Rhosis

16

I second Seinfeld from the stills alone.

What’s with Now. Voyager aside from Betty Davis and two guys from Casablanca?

17

This would be the one that rings the most true for me. Don’t get me wrong - the films are entertaining for what they are - but it took me a long time to stop holding their overwhelming popularity against them. As a kid growing up as a fan of speculative fiction, I longed to see a good “hard SF” film adaptation of . . . well, just about anything I loved - Asimov, Heinlein, Sturgeon, etc. Seeing Star Wars proclaimed as the best thing to ever happen to science fiction was grating. For a long time.

18

Well Aesiron, I suppose you wanted answers of a more culturally sophisticated nature. However, I guess I’ll air my pet peeve - The Simpsons. No, not Jessica and Ashlee - I mean the TV show. I’ve been an SDMB member for a year and a half and I’ve been astounded at all the pro-Simpsons postings. I really can’t think of even 1 anti-Simpsons posting. Personally, I can’t stand the show. Yes, I’ve withheld my opinions about this subject for all this time, but this is definitely the thread to post it.

19

Another one who finds the two-three dozen episodes he has seen of The Simpsons over the years mildly amusing at best.

Sir Rhosis

20

Nah. The Simpsons counts. I’m not sure how critically acclaimed they are but I have a vague impression that they are and if nothing else, I mentioned Star Wars in my OP, didn’t I?