Thread by @VespertilioGem

Good Evening, All! I feel like a topical #Kissmatewatches would be best tonight! So get out your holographic goggles and shotguns with LEDs taped to the sides, we're tackling a "CyberPunk" movie!

Tonight is going to be "Gamer" (2009) dir by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor. Convicts and poorer people have a mental implant where other people can control them like a character in a game. Simon has to control his man through 30 victories in a """Video Game""" to set him free.

#Kissmatewatches It's been a LONG time since I've seen this. Let's see if it's anything like how I remember!

#Kissmatewatches We start off with stock crowd/city scenes from all over the world with buildings being covered by ads for a game called Slayers. We get a look at the game as it's being played by real people! Graphics can't get any better than that, I'm guessing!

#Kissmatewatches We have people teabagging other people, a war zone with two people passing money back-and-forth robotically, overlays of a "Save Point" not too far away. An actual war zone with real people, but still so much like a shitty first-person shooter.

#Kissmatewatches Cable is our main hero, I'm guessing, as we see him make it to the Save Point quickly and alive. We talk about how he's going to get out after 3 more games, but he doesn't seem excited about it.

#Kissmatewatches We get a look into "Society", a sim where players controlled actual people instead of an animated character. Walking, talking, drinking, and sex were all just normal activities one could do to their person/avatar.

#Kissmatewatches The creator, Ken Castle, became a billionaire practically overnight as it created jobs (avatars come from somewhere) and got people interested. He unveiled Slayers, the first-person shooter of ultimate death proportions.

#Kissmatewatches The US Fed Gov (and 68% of Americans) agreed to a game where death row inmates can volunteer for a chance to be set free, if they survive 30 games. Those who volunteer but can't fight are NPCs that only have to survive one round. Their chances are not so good.

#Kissmatewatches The bullshit part is that this is funding the prison system and keeping "the bad guys in". As if the American prison system doesn't already have it's own fucking profit margins.

#Kissmatewatches I would have said the Fed Gov agreeing to this was BS, but after Covid... I might actually believe it.

#Kissmatewatches We learn that Kable wants to go back to his wife and daughter. A woman slips him his family photo and takes as payment a signature and a blood sample. We never see her face though.

#Kissmatewatches Cut to "Society" where the movie decides to show us shocking and disturbing things to be shocking and disturbing. It's no different than the rest of the writing, so it's not really anything to write about.

#Kissmatewatches We follow a woman who looks like Kable's wife working as one of the avatars. Her player is- Oh god fucking shit balls
...Her player is a VERY overweight man who eats waffles by the fistful. Because no one online is actually a girl. It's just fat lonely men. Gag.

#Kissmatewatches The male players who control Kable's wife and the man she's forced to hit on both start openly touching themselves while the two avatars begin to make out. Then a screamer virus happens (scaring me in turn) and it pisses Hornball off.

#Kissmatewatches The virus is nothing new. We've seen it happen with Ken Castle's interview. It's from a group called Humanz. They think Ken is an asshole wanting to enslave people. He watches this news with nature scenes behind him while he chomps down chips.

#Kissmatewatches It's time to talk about the overall writing. It's BAD. Everyone is either trying to fuck someone of the opposite gender, say/do as many offensive things as possible, or try to replicate a Call of Duty player's vocabulary. It's so very childish/immature.

#Kissmatewatches It feels like "cocksucker" is the new and trendy "WTF" or the new "LAWL".
And I get why. Only a childish society would allow this remote-control-on-dad bullshit. But it makes racism/misogyny/fatphobia seem trendy and cool. I'm not okay with that.

#Kissmatewatches Kable goes out for his 28th fight. He fails to save a Muslim NPC (which I feel was definitely a bad choice as she's the only Muslim so far). The only female inmate has her head exploded by enemy fire. And then Kable gets cheered on by people all over the world.

#Kissmatewatches We learn from the following transport scene that the inmates don't know the players are. I like the transport scenes as they're emotional scenes in a sea of blandness. One problem: the strobing is stabbing my eyes! I actually cannot watch these VERY short scenes!

#Kissmatewatches The player controlling Kable is an absolute rich white douche named Simon. After a ton of slurs and misogyny, he realizes he's got mail. Humanz is giving him a program to talk to Kable directly.

#Kissmatewatches We learn Kable has a weakness: there's a delay between Simon's commands and Kable's motions. So to kill him, Ken is sending a feral black man with no player controlling him. Yay, racism.

#Kissmatewatches I'm extra pissed because we could have had a genuine funny action star here! Ron Pearlman, Nick Cage, just someone campy and fun to break up the grimdark BS of this boring world! But nope.... random feral black man. I feel cheated.

#Kissmatewatches OH GOD IT'S TERRY CREWS

#Kissmatewatches We get the Ping/Delay mentioned again. Then Terry just straight up tells Kable that he doesn't have a player. So the bad guy's secret plan isn't very secret any more. Oops.

....Wait, is Terry singing "I've Got No Strings"? I take it back, that's kinda funny!

#Kissmatewatches Next game, Kable is amazed this 17 year old is keeping him alive and how little morals this kid has. Kable barely survives Terry's onslaught due to a gun malfunction (or hack?). Kable talks about "turning him[self] loose" so Kable can react without the delay.

#Kissmatewatches That's all we get as next we see his wife slutshamed while trying to win custody of her daughter. They don't take her seriously because she has a job in Society. It's very gross and anger-making.

#Kissmatewatches Simon starts buying upgrades for Kable, when he's interrupted by Humanz. They want him to turn Kable loose as well, and even give him a good reason to do so. "No Kable, no pussy, no shit." Good enough for Simon!

#Kissmatewatches The mystery woman talks to Kable again. She tells him to escape, forget the save point. He asks her to get him drunk. Later on, he chugs the vodka before heading out to the game. He stumbles around drunk. This is good because...?

#Kissmatewatches He pukes his vodka in a truck and hotwires it, escaping the game zone.
I don't think that's enough to get a truck working, but hey, the plot's progressing!

#Kissmatewatches Kable is listed as dead and his real name (Tillman) is blasted all over media. The woman who interviewed Ken Castle wants to reach Tillman's wife for comment. This can only go swimmingly.

#Kissmatewatches Tillman is found by mystery woman who takes him to a dark room filled with people playing on old school arcade cabinets. This is the Humanz HQ. They go on about how Castle is throwing humanity under a bus and people are going with it because they have no choice.

#Kissmatewatches I want to hear and know what they're saying, but two things are a problem.
1. They talk too fast and too monotone for me to really catch the words/meaning.
2. The camera work is making me sick again with all the fast cuts and quick movements.

#Kissmatewatches They only really catch Tillman's attention when he says that they know where his wife is.
Cut to her getting sexually assaulted, getting saved by Tillman, then sexually assaulting Tillman against her will.

#Kissmatewatches Hornball gets off on Terry killing two kissing innocents while Tillman's wife is clearly freaking out. That was SUPER uncomfortable!

#Kissmatewatches Tillman gets his wife back (still under Hornball's control) and she leads them to a rave (WHERE MY EYES AREE BLEEDING THANKS). They exit out the back where the journalist from before (Gina) saves them.

#Kissmatewatches We learn Tillman was "framed" for the murder he committed. He was one of the first "Beta Testers" for Society's tech. Turns out, he was controlled to kill his best friend. By Ken Castle himself.

#Kissmatewatches Simon finally gets out of prison (by someone high up?) and returns to critically pissed off people. The Hornball is found by Castle's men. We learn Ken Castle adopted Tillman's daughter.
Did Ken also the prisons go bankrupt so he could save them and get rich???

#Kissmatewatches Tillman gets taunted with images of his daughter and Humanz HQ getting raided. Ken makes inmates dance beside him before sending them to try to kill him.
Why couldn't we have his camp all throughout the movie???

#Kissmatewatches Castle goes on about his evil scheme how he can transmit signals instead of receiving. The real puppet master. In fact, he even reversed the Humanz crack and can somewhat control Tillman now.
But Simon is somehow seeing what's going on too.

#Kissmatewatches Tillman is being forced to kill his family, but then Simon gains control! Now it's a mental fight!
That's won by the "Don't Think About Me Killing You"/Reverse Psychiatry trick.

#Kissmatewatches Kable kills Ken, asks very politely that the Nanex controlling people be turned off, and walks away with his family. He free. (No seriously, it worked.)

The End.

#Kissmatewatches This was a HOT MESS of a movie. I did not enjoy it. It was all kinds of offensive, seemingly for offensive sake, and pulled its punches with all the fun it could have had!

...And yet...

#Kissmatewatches If I had to defend this movie:
It's made for an audience who wants to see shock humor and offensive things. People who like realistic, bloody games and South Park. And this movie is telling them that they are the bad guys. It's NOT okay to be Cartman!

#Kissmatewatches This is reaching to a crowd who needs to hear this message, not the people who already know it!
But the problem lies in that the movie is still giving them what they want: offensive and shock humor. So the message falls flat.

#Kissmatewatches This is a great example of Truffaut's Law.
Just instead of an anti-war film, it's anti-violence.
tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.…

#Kissmatewatches But seriously, this film was bad. Would not watch again. Mostly because the visuals gave me a migraine.

1/10, I'm calling this the "Cyberpunk 2077" of 2009. Same eye pain and offensive dialogue, but early.

@threadreaderapp Unroll please