There’s also the culture war, media shills who want that sweet access to the studios for ad revenue, and media snobs. Those are also factors. Like MatPat said, find the critics who share your tastes, liked most of the movies you liked, hated most of the movies you hated, or at least were interesting enough that you made your own judgement apart from the reviewer (which you should do anyway), and use those sources to see if you want to spend time and money watching a particular film, show, game, or whatever else. We only have so much time in our lives, so why waste your free time on something you won’t like?
a person or thing that makes something bad less severe, serious, or painful.
“we’re holding bonds as a mitigator of risk”
something that lessens the gravity of an offense or mistake.
“the law lists a dozen mitigators, such as mental problems the defendant was suffering”
Tell that to Marvel’s latest supervillain, the Mitigator. Look, I stay out of the culture war so long as it stays out of my stories, which is happening less and less. Case in point: a story from the upcoming anthology Women Of Marvel 2024 written by Gail Simone entitled “The Women Stolen From Marvel” if I understand the trailer correctly. It features this.
So a planet of gay dudes until the population dies out? That IS evil to straight men. This is the Mitigator, who we learn in a series of panels posted by Bleeding Cool (alt link through Internet Archive for those of you who hate the site–I want us all on the same page) saw the internet and concluded people didn’t want women in their comics. It’s the usual comment by creators who don’t like their use of women in comics questioned. Longtime readers of this site know I love my superheroines as much as their male counterparts because women act differently from men and thus solve problems differently, but I grew up when they stood alongside their male counterparts, not trying to make them look like chumps or taking on dudes three times their size like they’re mannequins to feel superior. Apparently “equity” isn’t about being equal but having equal time at being sexist idiots who keep the other gender down. That’s the culture war discourse, and why I don’t have time for the nonsense.
I can’t speak for the whole internet because I’m barely on Twitter more than hour a day, and most of that is promoting my stuff and occasionally seeing a trend that looks so incredibly stupid I have to check it out. Going by the circles I travel both right and left of the political middle that is not what superhero fans, both dude and dudette, want to see. They love superheroes the way they were before comics gained a lower sense of self esteem than I have, and decided to kiss up to the “cool kids” who still hate geeks and superheroes. The actual comic readers and superhero lovers want well written superheroines, not extreme feminist depictions of them. I see actresses getting sick of seeing “girl boss” in the description of movies they’re applying for because they’re boring to play without an obstacle to overcome besides “the patriarchy keeping you from realizing you were actually the awesomest ever the whole time”. When you struggle less than Arnold Schwarzenegger in Commando, you’re not going to be interesting. And that was a movie about a “girl dad” throwing a pipe through Ransik’s body before he could pull a bone sword out of his leg. I may be mixing stories. Point is the Migitagor is an idiot, and we’re going to go over the posted panels to see WHY he’s an idiot.
Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as a read-along book club.
Last time we got to see some of the internal issues with the characters unique to this story and the sequel, as they’re only evidence for the reader right now. We also got to see a Vulcan funeral, and someone finally made her move.
We’re maybe a third of the way through this book, and I have enjoyed some of the glimpses of Vulcan society, but I’m hoping we’ll get to the actual mystery, which we only know exists because of the title and back cover. That bit of impatience is totally on me, and reading it a chapter a week may be playing into that. The thing is, from a critical perspective it hasn’t been bad pacing. They’re still trying to figure out what happened. We do get time for a funeral and the characters’ personal conflicts will most likely factor into the story. So there’s nothing wrong with the story. It’s all on me, and I want to get into it.
I think the last Star Trek novel I reviewed plays a factor as well. The way Prime Directive told its story kept making me want to find out how they got there to appreciate what else was going on. I was also waiting for the titular Prime Directive to play a role, but it was so minor that it felt like a lie to call it Prime Directive, when the title should have been saved for a story ABOUT the Prime Directive. I know this story is actually going to be about the murder, but I’m hoping the cast gets let in soon that there was one. I mean, the murderer already knows, but did he or she get the wrong target or does the killer even care? I’m hoping for some pushing of the plot this chapter to go with the pushing of the character parts. I expect character parts. This is classic Star Trek. I also like the action part. Enough things have been happening that I’m still invested in the story, but I really want to get on with the main story soon. Maybe now?
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