On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the series has an approval rating of 42% based on 38 reviews, with an average rating of 5.51/10. The website’s critical consensus reads, “Bloated and boring, The Purge kills its own fleetingly fun premise and proves that not all stories work better on the small screen.” Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 44 out of 100 based on 13 critics, indicating “mixed or average reviews”.

^ WTF is this shish? ^

I’ve watched through both seasons of the Purge and I’m pertty confident… like, sure it’s not for everyone, but “bloated and boring” Oh no no no no.

Sure, there’s a fair amount of talking heads in season 2, but I’ve sat through boring never-intended-to-end netflix shows. I’ve given up on series that clearly were not going anywhere. I stopped mid story Scream and I know what you did last summer because this show was more interesting.

Nearly every scene has development and twists. What pushed me over the edge to check it out was she fact that the series creator stepped out of the way to make space for minority writers, now every beat of the series seems to hit home.

The two series are different stories. Each has a cast of characters that have independent struggles, then backstories, then they all converge in some contrived way. But the action and twists along the way are constantly invigorarating. Yes, some are predictable, but in a believable way… imo… that’s definitely subjective. But I was pulled in…. The ratings for this show makes it seem like few peoiple could be pulled in. I don’t think so. It’s realisticly not for everyone, but I love the misdirections, and how the plot went from inane action action slock to year long addiction, decentiztion, and balance of personal vs societal justice…. to action slock… the show was cancelled. They worked with what they had. Man, what a blast. I can imagine where season 3 might have went with the attemps of recovery from violent addictions in a world were violence was encouraged within provacative, hypocritcal bounds. Great show. I wish there was more.

… oh wait, I’ve only seen 2 of the films. Ka-ching!

My boss often jokes that he’ll end up in a covid concentration camp for not being vaccinated, but it’s pretty clear that he thinks that is a real possibility. He’s definitely not the only one I know to consider vaccines and passports comparable to the holocaust, but lets be real: the absolute worst the vaccinated can do to the unvaccinated is vaccinate them. There’s no point rounding up, capturing, or murdering the unvaccinated. The most dystopian thing that could happen is police restraint, then a shot in the arm. I’m not condoning that, but that’s the worst that can happen to the unvaccinated. Then they’re back in the same boat as the rest of us.

“Oh, but it’s about government control. They’re hiding the facts of natural immunity so that global heath industries get rich off us being sick.” … Okay. I wish we wouldn’t waste breathe on vaccine talk when that’s the real issue. Being suspicious of authority isn’t a bad thing, but this talk has some very hard to swallow points. It would require secretive, inside-job, double agent type work in competing private companies, congruent public firms and universities across the globe to come up with vaccines that aren’t actually supposed to be effective and false journals that all support the same narrative. The independent organizations would need to coordinate their discoveries with each other, while keeping their workers, students, researchers, and subjects in the dark about any evidence that doesn’t align with their goal, while making personal sacrifices to keep up the facade so that a few people at the top can reap the supposed benefits… of which also are not very clear. Power. Money. Oooo. Enough said, I guess?

People have always loved to talk about these types carefully crafted tyrannies. Whether it’s your jerk-ass boss at work, or the parents of a rebellious teen. If we don’t get our way, it’s easy to think that the people in charge want to harm us. But we know what major oppression, segregation, and genocide all look like in the real world. Especially these days. They all involve outsider groups who can’t change who they are, and typically shouldn’t need to. Visible minorities, the sexually and neurologically diverse, the poor… anyone who doesn’t fit into our economic system. Incidentally, these are the groups who will be least likely to access the resources needed for natural immunity techniques to supposedly be effective.

Did you get that, you oppressed unvaccinated? Your definition of oppression is being in the same situation as everybody else, while your solution automatically disadvantages the groups of people who are actually already oppressed.

Otherwise, natural immunity is literally what we’ve been doing without vaccines, and its killed 5 million people in less than two years.

Where I live, we’re kind of at the point where it’s like, yeah, enough of us have been vaccinated that I don’t believe we can reasonably do better. I can totally get behind the fact that our society isn’t nearly nuanced enough to handle this situation in a satisfying manner, and I do think we need to keep looking for other options, but don’t be the tool who actively fights to push us all backwards. It’s exhausting and makes no sense.

How to use a five star rating system

…

How I use a 5 star rating system

I’m not doing any research, and I have no idea how others use it.

So ages ago itunes, or maybe winamp, or maybe realplayer, introduced the 5 star rating system for your music. I painstakingly applied it to my library then suffered a hdd crash, lost it all, and didn’t use it again for many years. Several years ago I started using it again, and as a music hoarder it’s been a huge help. Especially through Foobar2000. Search up “%Rating% GREATER 3” and I don’t have to worry about company randomly hearing a Final Fantasy death march.

It’s useful, but daunting, especially if you have a lot of files. But it doesn’t have to be daunting, and it’s so beneficial that I’ve been applying the logic to all of my entertainment files via Tag Spaces.

The secret to it not being daunting, no matter how many files you have?

• Start by rating everything as 3 stars.

That’s your median number. From there everything is essentially a binary that you can say “yes” or “no” to as you come across the files.

But there’s 5 stars, if 2 and 4 are no and yes, what’s 1 and 5? Very no and very yes? Essentially, but if you’re thinking in terms of quality I’m sure you’ll soon notice that gets things pretty muddy pretty quickly. Here’s what your actually rating:

• Repeatability.

You’ve obtained the file, you’ve shown interest in it, give it the benefit of a doubt that it’s earned 3 stars. Now, if you have a mixed playlist and it pops up again, would you consume it again? Heck yes? 4 stars. Mmm, too soon? 3 stars. I’d rather not. 2 stars. I might delete it later, but it’s too soon to tell. 1 star. How about that mythical 5 star rating? Let time determine that one. Have media that still makes you feel warm and fuzzy after 5 years of repeats? Give that the medal.

There, that should help you simplify your feelings towards rating your files, but I admit, it still can be a bit tricky sometimes. So I have a final bit of advice:

• Use a 10 Star Rating System.

The best way to use a 5 star rating system is to use a 10 star one. Actually that gets a little confusing. I still use a 5 star, but I break by 0.5 stars. This allows me to have 3 stars as my median, and keep a 5 star at its legendary status.

1 Star = archives 1.5 Star = It’s a bad joke 2 star = it’s just a joke 2.5 star = I never seem to be in the mood 3 star = It exists. Here it is. 3.5 star = I approve of its existance 4 star = You should approve of its existance 4.5 star = OH YEAH 5 star = volunetarily Rick Rolled

But of course it will depend on having software that allows you to apply your own rating tags… Like Foobar2000 or Tag Spaces.

So because I feel like typing another list, here’s my advice in shortest form:

How to use a 5 star rating system

1. Rate everything at 3 stars
2. Raise or lower rating by how repeatable it is
3. Use a 10 star system

Masterclass.

This year’s pumpkin. A deer has already munched it.

I spent the other night making a list of movies for my boss. “Mindfuck” probably isn’t the right category, but I dunno. It’s pretty close for most of them. The last three movies are a bit divergent, but they flow nicely as a list.

1. 

   Triangle

   A good round-a-bout entry to start this list. Group of friends stranded in the ocean board a mysterious ship where they soon encounter copies of themselves. Some of them try to protect each other, some try to kill each other. Everyone just wants off the boat.

2. 

   Coherence

   Triangle, but with much less bloodshed. A group of friends have a dinner party while a comet passes overhead. The power goes off in the neighborhood, but they can see a light on in the house down the street, which looks “strangely” like their own.

3. 

   The Congress

   Continuing with the stoic, somber tone: a famous actress signs an eternal contract. It’s actually less fantastical than it sounds. She’s scientificly immortalized, but what happens when the mass public inevitabley looses interest?

4. 

   Under the Silver Lake

   I wasn’t fond of this movie, but it I think it fits this list really well. Hollywood is fake! But this movie gets really weird about it. There’s a lot of uncomfortable woman objectification in this one, but that’s supposed to be part of the theme… unfortunately I don’t quite get it, but it’s still interesting with a bunch of memorable scenes.

5. 

   Naked Lunch

   I love it when Cronenberg is given an actual proper narrative. An exterminator gets addicted to consuming his pesticide, then goes into hiding after killing his wife. Enjoy the disgusting insect puppetry while trying to decipher how blurred the line is between reality and hallucination.

6. 

   John Capenter’s The Thing

   Finally a break from questioning reality, but we’re taking the body horror up to 11. A “thing” is loose on an artic base. It absorbs life, then replaces its victims. The dog dies.

7. 

   Pontypool

   Speaking of contagions, what if speaking was the contagion? A radio host has a run in with violent, inchoherent zombies, and attempts to talk his way out of it.

8. 

   Beartrap

   An indie film shot in Edmonton. Exactly how sick and twisted is the new room mate? It has a slow start, and isn’t nearly as heavy as anything else on this list, but it’s well worth watching, especially because it’s literally impossible to find unless you know someone who bought it 10 years ago.