Watching movies again

Slowly i’m going back into watching movies, years ago i felt sick of movies industry (aka Hollywood) and i could not watch anything from them or anyone else, to explain that i need to write a long post about movie industry but i’ll spare you the agony, i’m here to write about what i enjoy.

Yesterday i watched Groundhog Day again, it’s one of these safe movies, i mean movies i like to re-watch over and over and it’ll never get old, i prefer watching older movies than watching a new ones, but there is always exceptions.

Star Wars movies, The Force Awaken, The Last Jedi and Rogue one, years ago i watched the original trilogy and the prequel trilogy, and i liked them, then i found Star Wars “fans” in youtube and other places, i’m glad i found them after watching the movies, because sometimes the worst thing can happen when you love something is finding other people who “love” the same thing.

Youtube these days can’t leave me alone without suggesting a many videos from people who hate the new movies, hate the prequel movies, and hate any changes made by Lucas on the original movies, they are angry all the time.

I’m baffled by that; people who define themselves by what they hate, you find them every where because they are the ones who care most to make other people hear them, comment sections around the web are infested by them, it makes hard for others to find good comments.

In the other hand there are people who love everything Star Wars and they are critical, they point out what is wrong with a movie without the need to be angry or insulting, they give me a chance to understand the movies deeply because i need help to understand stories in a deeper level, the same thing for art.

Another new movie i watched recently was Thor: Ragnarok, this is the first super hero movie i watched, i rarely read any comics* and i don’t know anything about this super hero world, but the movie stand alone, i didn’t need to watch other movies to understand what’s going on, it was mix of action and comedy, i don’t have much to say here, i liked it.

*I read 3 comic books, Watchmen, V for Vendetta and Logicomix, i highly recommend Logicomix, it’s a mix of history, math, logic and philosophy, it’s one of the deepest books i ever read, as for the other two; they are depressing stories.

Also i watched Inception, while i liked the movie i didn’t find it deep, don’t get me wrong, i thought the movie was well made, good acting but there is too much visual effects and action, from what i read in the web i thought there will be some deeper story.

This is just random thoughts on movies, i used to buy and watch at least one movie a month years ago, maybe i’m going back to doing that, but i’m more interested in old movies and few of new movies.

Here .. have a buff

Giving buffs to other players in WoW, i miss that, Legion removed buffs, BFA gave us some of them, so i took my priest to Goldshire, stood over the Inn’s roof, there i gave anyone and everyone a buff, get your 10% stamina.

I kept doing that for about 25 mins, sometimes people will stop, look around, they don’t notice me, some do, some people remove the buff! i wonder why, i keep giving buffs, i’m enjoying this more than i should.

Someone noticed me!

Durrzam the orc

Victory .. i have a pink pet

He was a disposable character, i only wanted to see the new posture for male orcs then delete him, but he convinced me that he deserve an adventure like no other, a crazy path where he and he alone take himself around Azeroth and reach the Broken Isles and without taking single quest from any one.

Durrzam is a hunter orc, i complained enough about how old zones have old content and i’m bored with it, i don’t mind the slow pace but i want dynamic content, things to do other than questing and dungeons.

So this is a challenge, slowly i’m taking Durrzam from 1 to 110 without quests or dungeons, this is how i level him:

• Heirlooms, i little boost does not harm.
• Mining and herbalism, i wish i can take leatherworking and skinning to make gear for myself, but a little XP is important.
• Item quests are OK, when a mob drop an item which start a quests i can finish that quest, and if that leads to another quest i can do that too.
• No quests, that includes normal quests, daily quests, pet battle quests.
• Treasures, bonus objectives, rare mobs and Legion invasions, all of that are acceptable to gain XP.

Now Durrzam is at level 22, with 432 gold in his bag, who knew selling copper ore is profitable? i’m not going to write about him again until he reach level 60, then start the torture that is Outland and Northrend.

This is long term project, it’ll take months to reach the goal, why i’m doing this? well blame the in-between-expansions we have now, Legion is behind us, BFA didn’t really start, farming old dungeons and raids can get old and i love doing this stuff, so a little variety does not hurt.

Of course when BFA start i’ll focus on my main, so Durr will take a holiday.

Random thoughts about burning trees

Long post about burning a tree, not so much about WoW story, i’ll leave that for others.

(1)
Reading comments i read few saying: why do you cry over burning a tree, WTH?

What they meant here is trees are not worth crying for and that’s makes me feel troubled, even if the tree we talk about is made of pixels no one should ever say trees are not worth being upset about, if you don’t feel sad for cutting a tree you fail at being a human.

It’s been more than a decade now since a tree in my neighborhood removed, and to this day i still regret not trying to defend it, i could’ve stopped the workers and go to the local municipality to talk with them, at least they can cut some branches but the whole tree? i should’ve stopped them

It was there when i was but a child, it was there when we moved our house, i used to stand in my room looking at it, before summer the tree turn yellow then shed all the leafs, days later i start to notice the new green leafs, they take few weeks to grow to their full size, the tree comes back to life before summer and it is the greenest most beautiful tree in the whole area, and i let it die, i let them cut it, never ever think trees are not worth crying for.

Cutting a tree is not that different from losing a beloved pet, i like to think that most people understand that.

(2)
Burning Teldrassil is old news since last Blizzcon, we know this is coming, and i’m not upset about who did it or why, it wasn’t really that difficult to guess who will do it, i don’t like how to story is going but that what Blizzard choose.

The tree people talking about is a home for many fictional people and players, it’s not just a tree like any other, so when you burn it you burn people who live there, and you destroy a place of fond memories for many players.

As people we need a contradiction, changing and not changing, we need to change some things in our life because we get bored, and yet we have attachment to some things and we wish not to change them in any way.

When it comes to places people tend to prefer not changing them except when the place is horrible and unbearable, when we have nice places we want to keep them as they are, and it is important that cities try to balance between these two forces.

I live in a city of constant change, no place from my childhood survived, all the places i used to have fond memory of are gone, the city is a great place to live in (apart from the freaking hot summers) but i don’t feel any attachment to it anymore, the idea of living in another city was something unthinkable a decade ago, now? i’m trying to find a way to do that.

(3)
When people comment on a genocide i wish they clarify if they are justifying it or just explaining it, even if you are explaining the genocide you have to tell people that you don’t justify it, just in case if some people misunderstand you.

Now this is troubling me a lot, people who justify what the warchief did, we have to bring examples from real life and remind people that tyrants and terrorists justify their actions with ideals and ideologies, they did it for the good of people, to advance an agenda, for the greater good, to cleanse the world from “weakness” .. etc.

And no, we don’t have to wait the rest of the expansion to make a judgment, it’s like telling people to wait for the rest of world war II to judge the idiot who started the whole thing.

I can point terrorist attacks happened in home cities of some WoW players and tell them that the terrorist have reasons, they are not merely doing that for fun, and if i say the terrorism is justified how will people feel about that? … and to make it absolutely clear: i’m not justifying terrorism of any kind.

Yes, WoW is a game, but the story is not just a story, people from ancient times used  stories to teach ideals and preserve culture, that’s why i find it disturbing to read some people happy about the atrocities in real life or in fictional ones, let’s not forget that in our near past politicians justified killing the innocent for the greater good, their story is they are doing a hard thing for the greater good … Spoiler Alert: we never saw the greater good, we witnessed destroyed societies.

(4)
Because many players didn’t like what they saw in the game, and in this age of social media it is easy to get direct access to people who did the hard work and harass them and be rude to them.

It’s amazing how people can’t grasp the simple idea of not being rude, and when you tell them off they replay with the same old broken record of freedom, them being honest, or them being selfish jerks who know they can keep doing that, because they are cowards who hide behind the screen.

One happy note: i’m glad to have so many wonderful bloggers, people who can write without the need to be rude.