So many

I find it helps to avoid the hype trains surrounding new media releases, as well as anything after the teaser trailer.
Getting one’s expectations up usually results in the said media failing to live up.
Best to go in blind and make your own mind up afterwards!

When you find mediocrity unacceptable, popular shit doesn't usually suit your palate. This isn't a bug, it's a feature.

Everyone around me said i should watch Napoleon Dynamite because it was sooooo funny. It was just an autistic kid doing and saying cringey things.
I also hate Donnie darko, Requiem for a dream, 90 % of David Lynch (especially Mulholland drive), citizen Kain, etc. Too many to mention.
- Citizen Kane is so celebrated because of how revolutionary it was and how much it influenced pretty much every movie made after, with then-novel techniques in things like cinematography and non linear story telling. Just tons of stuff that had never been done before. Of course if you compare it to later films it won't be all that remarkable. Everything it did first is now everywhere and we kinda take it for granted.
  
  I get that. But as innovative as it was, it is severely dated in pretty much all ways now. I went to a pretty pretentious university and was surrounded by people who glossed over the fact that all of the things you've mentioned have been used more efficiently since then and would try to force their friends to watch it with them multiple times.
- I like Napoleon dynamite, but i don't think i'll ever rewatch it. I watched it a couple of times when it came out with friends. And it's almost more the experience than the movie. When i watched it the first time i thought there is some massive plot twist, like some of these people are aliens or something. Then the movie was over, and nothing really happened. I don't think any of us really liked the movie, but then we just randomly quoted some lines and we re watched it, and we just always had a great time.
  
  I saw it in theaters and thought it was pretty goddamned stupid. Then, for various reasons, I ended up watching it multiple times with friends and somehow it just kept getting funnier.
  Great movie? I don't think so. But it's definitely something of a cultural touchstone for me.

I have never tried so hard to like an artist as Frank Ocean. He isnt for me, other than his Earl festures and when Three Stacks did a quick track on Blonde.
Its no disrespect, its me thats the problem

I try to avoid a lot of discourse around movies/books I haven't seen yet as the expectation can ruin it for me. That said, Infinity War and Ready Player One (the book) still get me angry thinking back on them and the hype didn't help. (Public opinion seems to have flipped largely on the latter, but there was a point when it was held up)

Eternal sunshine of a spotless mind. I walked away thinking wow that was boring and I really hate Jim carry.
- Jim Harry's best role was the mask. Because his normal stupid Jim carry shit fits well with the character. Other than that he annoys the shit out of me.
  
  Jim Larry's best role was the Truman Show, I think. One of my favorites.
  
  I like Jim Barry but I can see why if you don't click then his antics would get annoying very quickly.
- One of my favorite movies but I definitely get this take on it, isn't for everyone

The Godfather. Despite several attempts I've never made it through, it just can't hold my attention.
- I liked it but agree with this sentiment

Anything from Quentin Tarantino, his writing style just bugs the fuck out of me, he is so far up his own ass and it shows with every stupid pretentious monologue.
So much sound and fury, signifying nothing.
- Quentin Tarantino is just a teenage edgelord with a foot fetish.
- I'll always like pulp fiction, because back then it kind of redefined for me what a movie is. And i was then excited to watch more of his stuff and it just seemed to get worse and worse. I was shocked when i watched death proof, because it was just garbage.
  
  I hate to be that guy, but wasn't Death Proof kind of intentionally fucking stupid? Same as Planet Terror which it was bundled with. I always assumed that was the point.
- No mention of his foot fetish?
- Dude, I don't want to downvote an opinion, but this one is fucking hard.
  
  I apologize for nothing.

for me it's more anger, like "why the fuck did i even waste my time on this and what's wrong with all these people"
i wish breaking bad was a movie because at least the only time I wasted would've been around 2 hours. bring your fucking downvotes i don't care if you don't mind pointless plot points that keep going nowhere, and repeatedly underlined things are either dropped unceremoniously, or meet very unsatisfying and unbelievable ends. breaking bad was badly written and entirely carried by its phenomenal actors.
- I want to down vote you but everytime I think I want to rewatch breaking bad I just....don't. And I rewatch other stuff all the time. I do love the cinematography though.

Parasite for me.. I know I'm wrong but I don't know why.
- I almost forgot about this one. I think that's telling..
- Same. I mean, it wasn't a bad movie, but I didn't walk out of the movie theater and think about it a lot after, either. Even though it's supposed to be a movie you think about. I like all sorts of foreign films, so it's not that.

Inception
- This and The Joker are the two movies that come to mind when this type of question comes up. Inception is not particularly bad, just so.... correct. I was expecting something really mindbinding, that would make me rethink about it long after the movie was over. It was just a pretty scenery with mid acting. No amount of practical effect can carry a movie on his own. The Joker on the other hand was just a waste of my time and left me infuriated.
- This one for me too. I watched after hearing all the hype, and I just thought it was subpar at best and actively bad at worst.
  I figured it was because those who hyped it had never been exposed to the ideas in the movie and thought it was special. While my old ass had seen these ideas hashed and rehashed a dozen times over the years.
  It felt like a new Brat Pack phoning in a pay check.
  
  This is why I consume zero hype for any movie. Ive ruined so many movies by having a set of expectations going in.

Never liked Star Wars. The original trilogy. I watched it and nothing no sense of adventure no tension just blah. The new ones are worse, watched all of those too but they fail even harder for what feels like the same reasons. To be clear I fucking love Sci-Fi books/movies/tv shows doesn't matter. Some of the starwars books are ok like anything with Kerra Holt in it
- First off, Star Wars isn't scifi. It's a space western/opera. Its the same story told a thousand times before but in a different setting. It doesnt offer any philosophical quanderies or insights that actual sci fi does .
  It has always been about being a great cinematic achievement for it's time. Theaters have great sound systems because of Star Wars. If you werent of the age to experience it at a time when the biggest movies were 'Kramer vs Kramer' and 'Harry And Tonto', it really isnt very good.
  It's totally okay to not like it. I was a HUGE fan when it came out but I understand that it doesnt keep up with the cinema tech that it inspired.
  My wife and friends think I'm a Star Wars nerd and keep giving me gifts and swag. I have never liked any of it past the original trilogy and I outgrew that a long, long time ago. In fact, all the other trilogies just downright pissed me off for how awful they were...just horrible dialogue, acting and storytelling.
- Personally i find star wars to be fine but not great. It has interesting lore and whatnot but on the whole it mostly just feels ok. The exception (to me) is the mandalorian. Where the main star wars films are (sort of) a soap opera in space (space opera), the mandalorian is a space western, and a pretty well done one. It takes 2 episodes or so to pick up the pace, but i found it to be really enjoyable.
- Andor/Rogue One are very, very good. All else is cold day old dogshit unless you grew up with it and have nostalgia.

I absolutely hated both Dune Movies... Such a boring and in my opinion incoherent mess. My jaw dropped when i found out it was So universally highly rated. It still makes me angry when i think about it.
- I liked the visuals / cinematography of the 2021 version, but I haven't gotten around to watching part 2 because I'm not really invested in the story.
  It felt like a lore dump that didn't really build much connection to the characters, followed by a bit of action and some heavy sequel-baiting.

Everything Everywhere All At Once. I found it utterly boring, yet everyone seemd to love it, especially my fellow ADHD crowd. I never even bothered finishing the film which is bloody rare for me.
Yet I like mind-bending films like Primer, and chaotic films like Crank, and heck, I even like Battleship as a guilty pleasure that I can turn my brain off to... But this film? Bleh.
- I didn’t get the hype when I watched it the first time shortly after it was released. But when I rewatched it recently it hit differently. There was less need to try to keep up with all the random things that are happening so fast and instead I focused on the deeper message about the meaning of and the appreciation for our lives with all the good and bad going on.
- I felt mostly the same way watching it, but I also think the ending of the movie is important to understand the soul of it. I wasn't crazy about the humor or the whole look-how-random-LOL vibe it had, but I do think there was something more beneath that. The performances were also very good.
- This is the exact film I came to comment. It tried way too hard to be quirky and rAnDoM.
  
  I liked it, but a lot of it seemed like reddit fan fiction. What if butt plug fight. Imagine they have carrots... Not saussages as fingers. Someone give this man gold.

The Deadpool Movies, just don't get them for some reason.
Feel like there's no real plot, nothing really matters, the humor is family guy level cameos and 4th wall breaks that are only funny when used sparingly.
It's like eating an Oreo but we took out the cookie so now you're just OD'ing on stuffing and not in a good way.
- The "humor" is just Ryan being Ryan. He is a mean guy. It's funny on screen but IRL he is just that rude and gross to everyone without discrimination. I had to work with him twice and I dislike him. His wife is the same way. They are just objectively cruel for no reason. Which is funny when you're acting on screen only.
  
  Deadpool the character is an asshole, so it makes sense he'd be good at playing him.

What I'm getting from the comments is that these days I'm just a credulous fool and I like everything.
What I used to do when I didn't like something, was I would subconsciously sour grapes it into believing it wasn't that good and give myself an undeserved sense of superiority.
Like when I saw Sin City while in a bad mood, or felt like my subculture was being popularized in Tron Legacy. In those cases it really was just me.

I thought Black Panther was mid at best but it made me sound like a racist whenever I mentioned that.
- Ironically, this movie is pretty racist. The opening scene is a cliche basketball scene, and Wakanda, despite being a futuristic society, still uses tribal law and decides its leaders by fighting half naked to the death.
  
  I mean I'm confident they were to fight have naked due to eye candy. That 100% worked on me despite the bland writing.
- Aquaman too.
  Dudes are out there celebrating some aggressively average movies.
  
  Aquaman
  I agree with you in general, but I don't think you can pin this one on the dudes... or at least not the ones below 3 on the Kinsey scale 😆

Any of those boring-ass superhero movies. What is so appealing about hour-long GCI fight scenes and no plot?
- I think they just forgot the lessons from the earlier movies. They had action but there was a lot of build up so it meant something.
  Now you're just straight into a boring fight scene with no stakes. And somehow the bigger the stakes the less there are because you know they can't fail.
  And now even the rare consequences can be undone through time travel and multiverse bullshit.
  
  That's the whole thing with Infinity War, they failed hard and that made it a wild story.
- The colors! it's so many. Plus there is a plot it's just not very deep like in a comic book. The whole source material like 20 pages. It's not novels.
  
  This is very true, but id like to point out its a us comic thing. I'd invite you to read european comics, belgian ones in specific.
  The thorgal series, aria, joko tsuno, or hell even the suske & wiske reboot called amoras. They are teen/adult comics that are a lot darker and more flushed out story wise than us hero comics
- Never forget the golden rule: DC;RtRR, or
  Disregard capeshit; rewatch The Raid Redemption

Saving Private Ryan for me. And I fucking love the genre and the actors.
- Genuinely surprising. I know not every movie is loved by everyone, but I thought Saving Private Ryan was generally regarded as one of the better efforts. What other movies do you enjoy from the genre?
  
  So my favorite mini series of all time is Band of Brothers, I watch it yearly. I've tried several times to make sense of why I don't like saving private Ryan, and The closest I've ever come is some of the casting decisions I just felt were a little bit off, the performances a bit stilted.
  Again, not shitting on the movie just trying to explain why it never did it for me.

Am I doing this for Big Mouth or is it really that awful? Seems like the only humour is shock stuff but the shock has long worn off. I can't even tell who it's meant for, kids who ignore the rating that might still learn something from it?
- Yeah I liked it at first and then it turned into just trying to one-up themselves on grossness

Interstellar for me. Great soundtrack though.
- It's soooooooo boring. I've suffered through it twice and both times I was completely checked out waiting for the movie to end to go do something else with my friends.
  To make things worse, I work in the aerospace industry on spacecraft so this movie regularly comes up in conversations and inevitably I end up having to explain how I did not like it
- The groan I emitted in-theatre at the "but what about the power of love?" line is brought up whenever this movie is mentioned among the group with whom I watched it
  
  That’s hilarious. I think I’ve blocked that bit out. But I was giggling when the idiot was using morse code to communicate with his daughter in the past.
  And the entire Matt Damon and robot bit could have been left out. It added absolutely nothing to the film.
  Edit: found this https://youtube.com/shorts/4aZf1c-SOWY
  I had definitely blocked that trite dialogue out my mind to save space for something more important, like digits 700-800 of pi.
- I enjoyed Interstellar, but I also went into it expecting so-so sci-fi and instead got an interesting story with really cool world building. I guess my expectations for anything space in media are low enough to not be disappointed by most films

Don't look up was that movie for me. Almost everyone praised it to high heavens, with me smirking at maybe 2 lines / scenes throughout that entire slog.
Each to his own, I guess...
- I enjoyed Don't Look Up for the comedic pacing mostly. Where every time you seem to get a feel for the mood and direction it has something subversive to throw you off. Definitely could've been less on the nose with the allegory but some people just need some things shouted into their face for a chance at getting it
- Nah, me too. Felt like the whole movie it was looking over at the audience like "Ehhh, Ehhh? You get it?"
  
  Yeah, it was just way too much "in your face". Ppl said it was a great, thought-provoking parody, all I saw was a tryhard attempt at forcing through a rather bad attempt at that
- I get it, I liked it but it was kind of up it's own ass, but that recurring gag about the general asking for money for free snacks was great. There was one scene toward the end in particular that was all serious then Jennifer Lawrence brought it up that killed me.

It’s Top Gun for me. It’s just Tom Cruise being Tom Cruise in a flight jacket.
- Strangely enough there aren't that many movies that feature jets dogfighting though. That kind of makes it worth watching because I love Ace Combat and that's the closest thing I'll probably ever have to a feature film.
  
  In Ace combat 6 the player also flies down a narrow corridor and destroys the enemy doomsday weapon.

For me, it's Scott Pilgrim
- The movie kinda sucks but the comics and the netflix series are pretty good.
- Yeah never got that one sure there are funny things in it like people dropping video game coins when they get defeated, but Scott is a bit of an asshole and the girl he fights for is an insufferable entitled bitch. There is no believable reason why the exes would want to fight him either.
- Yeah. The comic was cute, but I think I was exactly the 10% too cool for school to really glom. onto it like many of my cohort.
  The vegan representation was kind of exciting, though…
- I forgot about that movie. I am also with you. I don't get it at all.

counterpoint: there are worse things than this

Oppenheimer
And even to an extent interstellar
I just find recent Nolan massively overrated
Which is ironic because The Prestige, Memento and even Dunkirk are great
- Oppenheimer
  YES. For me it was especially disappointing because I'm exactly the target market for this kind of film on every level.
- I think he plays with the timelines of some of his movies a bit too much to the point it’s just a chore to sort it all out. At the end of Oppenheimer I’m just like…great, now I need to watch this again. It still made sense but going back with the context of oh that scene is like years prior to the one we just watched…and that one goes after this other one.
  I still need to watch Dunkirk again because I honestly think the theater spliced a reel in the wrong spot. I was back at my parents for some reason that summer and saw it with them and some of my siblings…everybody was a little lost. So I’m withholding judgement on that till I see it again.
  Interstellar was at least more or less linear just with time acceleration.
  I haven’t even seen Tenet yet but from what I’ve heard…
  Prestige and Memento(oddly enough) I don’t have an issue with…
  
  Interstellar was at least more or less linear just with time acceleration.
  Except the library bit. If I stop Interstellar before the ending then I can enjoy it.
  
  Tenet is just laughably bad from an audio but also writing POV.
  Cool concept tho. He just managed to ruin it.
  I’d still recommend you watch it just for those two things.
  
  Unless you're seeing films at some kind of cinema revival, nobody does reels anymore. You saw the reel Dunkirk, so to speak.
- I both loved and hated Interstellar. Really loved the storytelling and visuals, really hated how sci-fi/magical it got towards the end
  I remember thinking at the end "wait, what was the entire point of this?"
  
  It feels like it should've been 2 films. The last quarter or so of the film just felt a bit rushed and overly-convenient. I absolutely loved the world building and general lore to the movie though
  
  Agree. A non-library cut is what is needed.
- The more I thought about Oppenheimer the less I understood why people liked it so I 100% relate
  
  The thing that gets me is that it was simultaneously way too long while also finding a way to be too short. Obviously years of history have to be compressed to fit into three hours of cinema, but they distilled what was originally months worth of conversation down to one or two lines of dialog in some cases. It's more off-putting to me than a two-hour film would have been if they had just skipped some of the details.
  I wish they had just taken some creative license and done what the writers of the miniseries Chernobyl did with the fictional Ulana character:
- I liked Oppenheimer because I found the man compelling, plus the cinematography and pace really complimented the drama of his life in a way that kept me engaged. I think one's enjoyment of the movie really comes down to if they find the decisions he made interesting or dramatic enough to be worth watching for 3 hours. If you find that boring then there's nothing really there to enjoy.
  
  I think it was the most useless movie to watch/record in IMAX. The trinity test was visually extremely disappointing (Nolan’s fault for not wanting to use CGI and rely on practical effects to mimick a nuclear explosion was just stupid..) and also Oppie as a character in the movie is extremely bland and shallow
  And finally once again the only relevant female character is laughably bad.
  IMO from barbenheimmer, Barbie was the best movie or at least the one I’d more easily rewatch
- Beyond the Barbenheimer memes, everyone pretty much forgot that movie existed after a few weeks.

if i lived life thinking there was something wrong with me just because i don't like something it seems like everyone else likes, then that would be one miserable existence--no thanks. anyway, for me it was the big lebowski--probably the most boring pointless movie i ever sat through
- The one saving grace of lebowski is that when you bring up not liking it the people who do like it are too busy quoting it to argue with you.
  
  Everything's a fucking travesty with you, man! And what was all that shit about Vietnam? What the fuck has anything got to do with Vietnam? What the fuck are you talking about!?
- Well that just like, your opinion man..
- Shut the fuck up Donny
- Agreed on both philosophical ground and impression of Lebowski!
- You know I feel that way about most David Lynch stuff. It is weird for the sake of weird. It does seem to go anywhere for me. He always has a underlying mythology for his movies that must be dug into just to come away with a basic understanding of the plot.
- Thank you. Plus his "best friend" (John Goodman) was a complete dick that did nothing of benefit for him the entire movie.
  Haven't watched it in years though, so I was planning to re-watch and see if my opinion changes.

Avatar. Technically the 3D was fun, but I can't understand any of the rabid fandom.
- Nobody actually liked that (Either the Kevin Costner one or the blue remake).
- i don't think I've ever seen a rabbid Fandom around it.
  it was just an easy approachable pretty movie for the masses. with a massive budget and a very well known director it brought people in to see the best visuals hollywood sfx had at the time. that's basically how it was marketed, as a tech demo.
  I've never once seen anyone fanboy about it. it sold well, but didn't excite many.
  on three other hand, avatar the last air bender has a massive and rabid fandom.
  
  don’t think I’ve ever seen a rabbid Fandom around it.
  were you around when the movie was just released?
  There was an insane weird fandom around it. From people just loving it to full on navi otherkin-ing. People getting depressed and suicidal to not live in that world. And I'm not talking about a handfull of people but quite a large group.
  
  I don't think I've ever seen a rabbid Fandom around it.
  Avatar is the second-highest-grossing movie of all time, folk can't seem to get enough of the science fiction epic and are going back for repeat viewings.
  it sold well, but didn't excite many.
  Which is why I list it here.
- Hard agree. Just generic sci-fi with obvious themes and plot.
- It's very true that "it was just Dances With Wolves in space," but Dances With Wolves is a good story. A good story + decent directing + pretty visuals = a movie that's at least decent, if not mind-blowing or whatever.
  Avatar 2, on the other hand, definitely suffered story-wise.
  
  "Dances With Smurfs," as South Park put it.
  
  I thought it was Fern Gully.

Anything Luc Besson. The scenarios are at most generic stereotypes with empty characters, with the usual ultra cringe sexy girl-child. People love his 5th Element, which is at best a generic action-scifi B movie, with no inspiration except purely stealing from Moebius. He doesn't know how to hold a camera, and he's even worse when it comes to editing. As a French, I'm surrounded by people who grew up with his movies and are very emotional about it so I can't say it too loud but... I hate it soooo much. (and yeah, he's a sex offender... who could have guessed?)
- I used to like that movie as a kid, but I've had a different perspective on it, and other films, since coming across this video about the "born sexy yesterday" trope
  it's an older video, but still relevant and edited very well.
  Fuck Luc Besson, and fuck his creations (I don't believe in separating the artist from the art).

I just can't get into The Big Lebowski. I've tried several times and can never seem to finish it.
For TV, it's Seinfeld. I don't find it funny at all.
- The Big Lebowski has a very specific style of humor and if you don't appreciate it for that, then there's not really anything left lol. The plot meanders around aimlessly as a joke and then the film just ends abruptly with almost no real satisfying resolution.
- To me, Lebowski is like most of the Coen Brothers movies: it has a lot of great scenes that never really come together in a meaningful way.
  
  I think that was actually the point of that movie. Like the only time he actually tries to do any detective work, it turns out to just be a sketch of a dude with a comically large boner.
  I kinda thought the disjointed nature was part of it, sending him through different social strata. Maybe I've watched it too many times while zooted, idk.
- Same on both

Breakfast Club
multiple hours of horrible teenagers and some horrible adults learning no valuable lessons and their actions being glorified
also the two love interest characters fall for each other despite having zero chemistry, cuz fuck you can't have a teen movie without a romance i guess
- I'm not saying your opinion isn't valid or anything, I'm just curious. Are you the right age? Were you in high school or close when it came out? And I don't just mean when you watched it, were you that age at the time the movie was set? As an adolescent a few years younger than the characters at the time, it resonated with me.
  
  I think I was either a senior in high school or a freshman in college. Also I'm a millennial, maybe it's more of a boomer/gen x movie

Oppenheimer Barbie Place Beyond the Pines
Didn't get the hype for any of them at all. Oppenheimer was just fucking stupid and entirely too long for no reason, plus the Florence pugh scene where shes just sitting with her tits out for no reason was just wildly out of place
Barbie was just generic trash, and everyone knew or should have known it was a money grab. I dont think it was feminist at all, it was basically Marvel but for girls, and I generally think most marvel movies are bad
Place beyond the pines was just boring. And the plot was horrid.
- Im a 40yo man and the Barbie movie didnt seem like a cash grab to me purely because Barbie has been a commercial property its entire life. There was a germ of love and creativity at its inception but its been decades of it being sold that the movie, if anything felt overdue.
  It was Marvel for women, it was a big budget flashy stupid movie (marvel) for women. It was definitely a good moment for feminists because they put big cash behind a movie that was almost repellent to men. They had to finance a movie based on the assumption that 50% of people would object to seeing it strongly.
  As a guy I like to say "It was great for a movie that I didnt like." It was well executed, fun, set design, practical effects and all were fantastic. But absolutely not meant for me and thats ok.
  
  I agree, I enjoyed it and it’s well executed, but not really meant for me.
  
  You say that, but I wonder who was the target audience because I am not aware of anybody I know liking it. Appart from some kids who liked the bright colours and the childish Farrel humor, but clearly they don't get all the meaning of the movie (and most adult jokes). I am a man, feminist and I hated it with a passion. My girlfriend and my women friends, all feminists, did not like it. My more apolitical friends thought it was just ok at best. It's a "white liberal girlboss" type of feminism that is too shallow for people really invested in this subject, and at the same time too obvious and in your face for anti-woke warriors. It felt like it was just a 2 hours long advertisement for Matel.
- Oppenheimer is so long because its based on the book American Prometheus
  The book is literally longer than the Qur'an.
  Quran on Audible: 20 hours. American Prometheus: 26 hours.

The Exorcist might be the most boring horror movie ever made.

What movie is it for you? For me, The Princess Bride.
- inconceivable!!!\
- Pulp fiction
- What?? That movie has everything, it's like the perfect movie. This is the only answer that has left me genuinely confused.
  
  This whole thread is kinda wild to me, but I think this Princess Bride answer helps me distill it down to: I'm ok with you not liking movies that I love, but how can you say that you don't understand other people liking it?
  I don't care for Star Wars or Lord of the Rings but never has it crossed my mind that this is more than just a matter of taste, that there are people whose preferences are outright wrong.
- I can see not liking that movie. It's very specific. Endearing for a shitload of people, myself included, but it's a very particular brand of comedy.
  Movie? Oh god there are so fucking many. One that comes to mind at the moment is Whiplash. Ive seen it 3 times because a dude I cared about deeply loved it. Everytime I saw it I got it less and less. I don't see why people like it at all.
  
  Oh man. I think Whiplash is amazing and the story absolutely sickens me at the same time. I can absolutely understand people not liking it.
- The book is fantastic
  
  Almost done with the Cary Elwes behind the scenes book too
- I second The princess bride but to add something new: (although not a movie but a serie)
  The Game of Thrones
  I love fantasy, I love medieval history, I love huge worlds, I love slow pace. But this one ... just didn't click, I don't even know why. I gave up after the 4th episode
  
  I know why - Martin can't write complex characters and confuses shock value for motivations. They're all caricatures, not characters. Its just a medieval soap opera.
  
  I tried the show twice and never made it to the second episode. Everyone who knows me is blown away by the fact that "I've never watched GoT" because I'm such a big fantasy nerd. I've even tried the audiobooks but made it maybe 2 chapters in.
  
  i was invited to a viewing party for a GoT season premier. i had never seen any of the show before and had no idea what i was in for beyond "gritty fantasy show". they all talked it way up, told me it was "sex and violence the TV show" and how much i would love it.
  it was so so so boring i thought it would never end. i'm baffled why it's popular.
  
  I just got annoyed that every character I liked died. Real life is depressing enough without watching fiction that also just bums you out.
  
  See if you can find "Black Sails" It's got all the sex and violence and intrigue GOT promised in a much more fast paced form.
- The Princess Bride is an action movie that many people don't realise is an action movie, I love it.
- I once knew someone who told me she couldn’t enjoy the movie because the ships traveled somewhere that was anachronistic to the time period.
  Like, what??
- Kingsman: The Secret Service. just... no.
- Grave of the fireflies. Didn't even shed a tear and I cry at everything. Someone psychoanalyze me.
- Everything Everywhere All at Once
- Is there a specific reason you didn’t like it or more a general meh?
  
  Like the overall premise of the post asks, it just didn’t click. For people who love it, I don’t think they’re wrong. I generally like the humor, and the cast is great– like legitimately great. But it might be the medieval setting that I seldom find interesting, or the magical/mystical things that I never do.
- Oh, there is my bus. Thanks to the Net I know all the characters and quotes. But I guess ~~Mel Brooks~~that movie's humor never really did it for me, sorry.
  (edit : apologies. I always thought it one one of his)
  
  I think you may be thinking of Robin Hood Men in Tights.
  
  Unless I’m misinformed, I don’t believe Mel Brooks was involved in The Princess Bride.

Me with Breaking Bad. Couldn't get past the first season
- I watched it all and didn’t particularly like it. It’s okay, it’s fun, def not the best series of all, like someone says. The fly episode is so bad, so bad.
- I forced myself through the first two seasons, and it turned out to be my favourite series, same happened to a friend. The show massively improves in season 3.
  
  Yeah, that's something I keep hearing, that it like, picks up in season 3, but I guess like... If a media only starts to get good halfway through the entire thing, I don't know how interested I am in it, personally.
  I'm genuinely glad that you enjoyed it when you got through it though! Maybe one day if I've got nothing else on my watch list I'll give it another go.
- The first season or season and a half are pretty grueling. I found it hard to watch at times. But as it got later into the show it really hit its groove. Still, I get where you're coming from.

This is me with any movie starring Will Farrell, but especially Talladega Nights. He can be good in supporting roles (Zoolander springs to mind), but all the movies he leads just don't land with me.
- Out of all the Will Farrell movies you could have picked you went and used the best one as your example?
  
  It's the best example of why I don't like him. It's a stupid movie about stupid people doing stupid things in a stupidly written way. It's one of 2 movies I've ever walked out on.
  
  I always give Stranger Than Fiction as an example to see Will Ferrall do a non-usual comedy movie, I enjoyed it anyways. Some people can't stand his usual schitck which I can understand. Though I do enjoy the studiest of comedy and he can nail that genre, but I do think it takes talent/skill to pull it off as well as he does.

Any of the mission impossible/fast and furious films. That shit is boring.

[off topic?]
I had heard about Gone with The Wind all my life and I knew it was incredibly racist. It finally came on basic cable and I decided to see what all the fuss was about.
I found myself watching and liking a movie I knew was complete and utter bullshit.
- Well, as a movie, it's a good movie. Great directing, incredible acting (for the era), with a dynamic and well paced story. It holds up in technical terms despite the shifts in style and performance that have happened over the years.
  If you hum really hard during the racist parts, you could still call it one of the greats. And it isn't like it's "birth of a nation" bad in that regard. There's way worse movies out there from the era, and the era before that was horrible on average.
  
  [nsfw]
  Watch an Peter O'Toole movie, 'The Stunt Man.' Great movie; funny, scary, exciting, romantic, plus a bunch of great plot twists.
  There's a scene where a kinda schubby screen writer talks about how he paid $1,000.00 to fly to Guatemala to have sex with a 14 year old virgin.
  That line was considered only mildly off-color when the movie came out.
- That's art for ya.
  
  https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-iron-dream-norman-spinrad/7751155?ean=9781490439457&next=t
  [nsfw, Nazi flag]
  The book was written by a Jewish guy named Norman Spinrad. In the foreword we learn that in 1922 Adolph Hitler went to America and became a science fiction illustrator and, after his English improved, a writer. This is his final and most popular novel, a tale of a young man who was exiled from his homeland and finally returns to find it under the control of a mysterious cabal of mind readers...

This is me with literally any movie that tries to get me to feel things. I'm pretty sure I have alexithymia.
Though sometimes I find myself thinking about a film weeks after I watched it, and I then it's like "I guess maybe I did like the film".
- alexithymia
  Huh, TIL.
  I don't have this, but I definitely relate to coming around to a piece of media only after I've had time to process it.

It insists upon itself.

For me, Star Wars and Lord of the Ring (the books, as well.)
The best part? I publish SF and fantasy for a living.
- I'm currently reading the LOTR books because I've never actually consumed any LOTR content and holy crap it's very long-winded. Entire conversations that could be just a couple of sentences go on for pages. I appreciate the incredible scope, the sense of scale and the creativity that goes into it but reading these books I can only think how perfect they are for adaptation into film or any other format really. Or if authors "covering" another's works like musicians do ever becomes a thing LOTR would be a fantastic candidate, because Tolkien's writing style is such a slog to read through
  
  Tolkien was a linguist first and foremost, and his writing shows.
- Fellowship is a slog. RotK is dope though

I haven't seen it since we watched it in a high school class, but I remember the movie Elf being irritating and cringey. Apparently a lot of people adore that movie, but I just don't get it.
Ditto with pretty much everything I've ever seen by Adam Sandler. Though, at least I've heard people dislike Sandler's work before. I've never heard anyone say they don't like Elf.
- My wife addores early Adam Sandler films, and I've really never seen any of them. She had me sit down and watch one Adam Sandler film one evening and while I could not stand his character in Billy Madison and turned it off within a few minutes, Happy Gilmore was quite enjoyable and a fun subversion of golf tropes.
- I still haven't seen this movie, and at this point I don't think I will, just because I enjoy people's reactions when I them I haven't got round to it yet.

Finished severance s02 this weekend. Very disappointing ending to me (that I will not spoil), even though it seems like it's all anyone could talk about a couple months back.
Maybe it's because I just played Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and we were spoiled with incredible writing that does foreshadowing excellently with deep and nuanced themes, but while Severance's execution is great in the details the overarching plot left me severely disappointed. As if they got great directors, actors, set designers, dialogue, but just wrote the s01e01 hook and then kind of just made up the plot as an afterthought. Keeping up mystery for its own sake because once the curtain is pulled back, we realize the stage pieces are not that impressive.
It's still good TV but it ain't that deep and IDK why everybody's raving on about it. Anyway thanks for coming to my ted talk.
- Severance S1 and S2 are vastly different in quality
  The first one is very very good. Gripping, with the right amount of suspense and plot advancement.
  Season 2 had sooo much filler, useless plot arcs and a lot of stuff that was only included to make it MYSTERIOUS.
  I was super hyped for S2 but it didn’t live up to the wait.
- i thought it was fantastic. lots of interesting moral questions get explored based on the premise. i cant think of any episode that didnt further the narrative. i dont think theyre keeping mystery up for mystery's sake, you learn about the world as the main characters do. way better than spoon fed exposition dumps. the plots pretty simple: man wants to rescue wife. idk who said to watch it for the plot lol its everything else that makes it worthwhile entertainment
  cant wait for the 3rd
  
  Except that Harbor was a known thing by several characters but we are intentionally kept in the dark for the sake of the plot. It was only a mystery to the innies and the audience. But since a large portion of the cast are executive outies, yes, it was mystery for the sake of the plot.
- This show was the world's most boring acid trip. Some cool cinematography, I'll give it that, but it's just boring.

It really depends on the movie, but I think most movies that people see as "universally loved" are children's movies, and the people who love them the most are those who watched them when they were kids. Sometimes, they're not very good if you see them outside of their intended demographic.
On top of that, everybody has their own tastes. I know a person who doesn't like Shawshank Redemption because she feels uncomfortable with enclosed spaces. And I'm personally not fond of movies with people who act like gangsters, so I've never felt particularly affectionate towards Godfather movies.
- I think most movies that people see as “universally loved” are children’s movies, and the people who love them the most are those who watched them when they were kids. Sometimes, they’re not very good if you see them outside of their intended demographic.
  Avatar the Last Airbender for me. I just can't get into it. I've tried watching numerous episodes and given up or have seen countless clips that just don't catch my attention. Seems most people who did started when they were fairly young and the love grew overtime, and all the power to them.
  I know a person who doesn’t like Shawshank Redemption because she feels uncomfortable with enclosed spaces. And I’m personally not fond of movies with people who act like gangsters, so I’ve never felt particularly affectionate towards Godfather movies.
  Funnily enough, I don't like those movies either and are also perfect examples of the title post for me. I don't think they're good, I don't think they're bad. They're movies that just sail right over my head and I'm like "I guess this one just aint for me."
  
  Atla is pretty long and if you didnt start watching it as a kid it could be pretty hard to get over the start of it. It starts off very slice-of-life-ish with some of the more mature themes sprinkled in between, and becomes much more dense later on. It's also a story about a bunch of kids (who grow and learn to cope or deal with their issues later on) which isnt the easiest to identify with unless you started watching it at a young age.

Top Gun 2 sucked ass.
- To be honest, so did Top Gun 1...
  
  It was just high budget military propaganda.
  
  You shush your filthy mouth! Never disrespect the memory of Goose!
  
  Top Gun was what I came here to say

Thor Ragnarok for me. I don't think there's something wrong with me for not liking it though. I have the objectively correct opinion about that movie and everyone who disagrees is wrong.
- I mean... It's not high art, it's just effective at being stupid and fun. It's not really trying to be traditionally "good" and I think that's why people liked it.
  
  It's effective at being stupid for sure.
  
  After however many movies Thor finally finds his element…like literally. Other than that yeah…it’s just typical Marvel one liners.
- I think it has to be seen relative to the other Marvel films, not films in general. It is a clear winner compared to Thor 1&2.
  
  I am comparing it to the othe Marvel films. It's garbage. It might as well be a parody. The thing that is even stranger to me is that people who liked it dislike love and thunder for the same reasons I don't like ragnarok. I didn't see it but from what I have picked up from clips on YouTube it looks to be basically the same tone.

I was a huge Star Wars fan before Disney took over, and haven't liked anything they've done with it. Most people agree, with 2 exceptions: Andor, which I admittedly haven't watched yet, and...Rogue One
I don't think Rogue One is much better than the other Disney Star Wars drivel, but I'm apparently the only person in the universe who thinks that. I've watched it three times and just don't get why people think it's good.
- I enjoyed Andor but I think that has more to do with it seemed to focus far more on telling a good story than relying heavily on all of the tropes that make Star Wars content Star Wars
- So I actually do like a lot of the Disney stuff (I get enough hate please noooooo) but Rogue One I cannot stand and don't understand why it exists. The whole movie was justified off of a single line from A New Hope and the ending of Rogue One changes the opening of A New Hope in a bizarre way. Went from him chasing her down to her literally being like 15 feet from him as he watches her leave and follows her easily. Not necessarily bad because Leia bold faced lying to Vader and giving no fucks is kind of hysterical knowing he just watched her 10 seconds ago but odd.
  Andor... I watched the first episode and was interested to an extent but I think I'd have to push myself through a few episodes to really get into it. I've been in stress mode the past few months so just rewatching what I like over and over again. I've seen Penn and Teller so many fucking times in the past 3 weeks...
  
  Interesting that we both dislike Rogue One, but I also don't like anything else recent. That being said, I'm always down for some Penn and Teller, those guys are great
- Rouge One was okay, in my view. It wasn't spectacular, it wasn't terrible, it was okay.
- In descending order: Andor, Empire Strikes Back, A New Hope, Rogue One. Everything below that isn't worth watching. (OK I didn't see any of the animated stuff yet, and I heard some of that was good, but I also heard a lot about baby yoda, so who knows?)
  
  for animated stuff skip the dave filoni garbage and go straight to Visions and the Genndy Tartakovsky Clone Wars.
  
  I want to read your next unpopular opinion on an even more controversial topic, especially if it involves sincerely held beliefs.
- I didn’t used to think this but now have come around to believing that it’s about how old you are because I dislike both the prequel and sequel trilogies but most people younger than me generally feel as good about the prequels as I do the original. Which seems like an obvious difference to me but I guess it’s that bias.
  
  I'm fine with the prequels, and I'm old enough to have seen a New Hope before it was called a New Hope. In the theaters even, though I didn't actually see it there. I don't think the prequels are as good as the originals overall, but I enjoy watching them every few years.
  But you're right, the prequels are almost always split on generational lines. Most of us old farts don't like them.
- Andor tells the story of how a full scale rebellion was born from a guy who pretty much wanted nothing to do with it and the choices the empire made for their agenda. Rogue one is the peak of that story and shows you just what it takes to defy a galaxy wide space government bent on total control.
  I liked it because i grew up on the original trilogy and it was nice to see a fleshed out depiction with characters who barely had screen time or none at all in the OT but had so much to do with the events leading up to it. It feels like history and they did it very well imo

Not a movie, but for me House of Leaves was awful. Most of the characters are extremely flat and we barely get to see them interact. The central gimmick of run-on footnotes and rabbit holes is more annoying than profound, even if it did tie into the themes well. The author also clearly has something against women, since I can't name a single female character who isn't a either sex object, a prostitute, or an adulterer. The horror atmosphere also didn't land for me, mostly because it's so surreal that I can't get invested in the characters as actual people.

For me, it's Wicked.
I generally like musicals, and I watched both the movie and the musical (w/ my SO, who loved it), and neither clicked for me. I felt the musical fell apart in the second half (I didn't like the ending at all), and according to my SO, most of my complaints are where it deviated from the book. The movie was a bit better (and I'll probably watch the second one, just to compare), but I still felt it was a bit generic. It goes way too hard on DEI concepts (skin color), and the characters seemed a bit shallow. I hope the second movie draws more from the book than the musical. It wasn't "bad," it was just pretty mid for me, not the knockout experience it was claimed to be.
The music was pretty good though, I'll give it that.

I'm like this with a shitton of movies because I just find drama boring and most of the big, popular films are dramas.
I like stupid action movies (Commando, Last Action Hero, Predator, etc), stupid comedies (Adam Sandler's old shit, Grandma's Boy, Dude Where's My Car, etc), and sci-fi. Sci-fi is also very much like drama, but at least it has lasers.

This is how I felt about Parasite, tbh
- Agreed.
  And some of Tarantino's movies, though not all.
  Fight club was another.

Star Wars. LOTR.
I’ll let myself out.
- lotr has always been meh to me. all the books after the hobbit were an absolute slog to get through, and the movies were just annoying. star wars--everything after jedi (and maybe even jedi itself) is polished turds
  
  With LotR you have to remember that the books were essentially the foundation of the genre so you have probably read and watched hundreds of derivative works, doubtlessly some of them an improvement over this early part of the genre in at least some aspects.
  
  Tolkien has some very dense prose and it can be tough to get through. The Silmarillion's even moreso, it reads like the King James Bible. I think what really kills it though is how influential it's been on the genre. So much is derivative of LotR that it no longer feels "fresh", kind of the same way The Beatles were mind-blowingly innovative at the time but now it all just sounds really generic and well-worn. You're bang-on about Star Wars too, I like Star Wars quite a bit but it goes groundbreaking movie (ANH), goated classic (ESB), schlock (the rest of the movies).

Everything Everywhere all at once was just ok

Young Frankenstein. I'm a fan of Gene Wilder and a huge fan of Mel Brooks, but somehow the comedy in that particular movie had me going "hmm, yes, I can see how people would find that funny" rather than actually laughing.