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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   35893 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022

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I’m going to compare this, for no reason at all, to Squid Game. Attractive, interesting actors with strong expressions who we emotionally relate to.

Did Squid Game really have that many attractive actors? I thought the one North Korean defector was very attractive (IIRC the actor is a model), but I found the others pretty average, possibly even below average by major-production-actor standards. There's the undercover cop too, I suppose, though he's barely a major character.

Yeah, if there's one negative comparison of American TV it's not that people aren't attractive. If anything TV - network TV especially - leans so far towards blandly attractive people that it can legitimately be distracting

I've seen it referred to as "CW casting" (in reference to a channel that pumps out mostly teen soap operas). Just blandly generic handsome people

This is one of the main things that kills a show for me. One of the most egregious examples I can think of recently was the new Wheel of Time series.

My personal feeling is that American media of all types really lacks charisma and drive. It's less that the actor's are attractive or not or whatever, but there's a charisma and flair there that I think that is lacking from most modern American productions. And I do think while it's not driven by politics it's linked to politics. People just got more important things to think about than art. Better and easier ways to gain status and be successful.

I watched Hot Fuzz again last night. And it's a shame that we don't get more things like THAT. Everything coming out of America just seems so stale these days. I don't think it's always been this way. I think there was a time where pushing the boundaries creatively was seen as a more respectable thing to do. And I don't like talking about it that much because it just feels harsh...but I also absolutely believe it, and I don't think it's just getting older. I do like newer things. Just I tend to not like things that come out of the US. I think it's a stale culture culturally. Movies, TV, Games, Music, all of it.

I too was very surprised to hear Squid Game actors called attractive. The lead has traditional leading man qualities, but most of the rest border on or are downright ugly.

Which was not bad! They were all very distinctive and as a white dude watching wall-to-wall Koreans I was happy to be able to tell them all apart easily. The ugliness even lent itself to the desperation of the characters and fit the mood.

I remember when Squid Game came out there was a lot of kerfuffle on Twitter over how attractive the man in the business suit who slaps the leading man a bunch of times in the subway was. I do think that he along with the Pakistani, the leading man, and the North Korean defector are both fairly attractive. I agree with you that the rest are on the uglier side.

However, I think that each character has a flair to them that makes them 'emotionally attractive', or maybe 'emotionally engaging' is a better word for it. When I think of Rings of Power, I think of blandness and of an odd uniformity. The Squid Game characters are more vivid, more engaging, more 'real', and I suppose that would make them more 'attractive to watch' in comparison.

The slapping man and the Front Man are both major movie stars in Korea (the Front Man has even crossed over to major Hollywood productions) essentially making cameo appearances in the show, so it's not surprising so many people found the former so attractive. I'll admit I found the protagonist fairly homely, especially by leading man standards, so I'm surprised to read a couple people say he was attractive.

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