thinking about the minecraft movie trailer, and why it feels wrong

i think the issue isn’t just that it’s cringe

it’s that it’s taking something genuine and earnest, and making it self-referential and incredulous about itself minecraft is a quiet, earnest game

you drop into an empty world, cut down trees, build a house. the house is lopsided and a little funny looking, but you made it, and so it matters

the game doesn’t point and snicker behind your back, “hey, get a load of this”

there’s an interesting parallel between AI art and early-20th-century architecture

we’ve all seen victorian architecture right? the classic gingerbread house. lots of ornate detail and mouldings

this was directly made possible by the industrial revolution

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https://twitter.com/ghosttyped/status/1820530375984308628

detail and ornament used to be the product of hand labor. they were a sign of wealth and luxury

but suddenly, they could be mass produced

factories spun up. you could pick products out of a catalog and decorate your house like a cathedral. people went wild

people don’t realize this but WALL•E is a straightforward retelling of genesis

the autopilot is god. the captain is adam. EVE is eve. and wall-e is satan wall-e lives alone in a blighted world of trash. his only friend is a cockroach (symbolizing pestilence)

he comes to paradise to tempt EVE with the forbidden fruit - an act that goes against their directive