Doesn’t the first month on the 24th day of the 24th year feel like some unofficial A24 holiday? Did you accidentally celebrate by watching an A24 title? Also, Jon Stewart is kinda sorta coming home to The Daily Show. The catch is, once a week, and only through the election season. I’m still upset Apple cancelled his show.
The Vegas episode tackled that whole casino and lotus flower plot line. It’s funny that the guy casually referred to as a mailman before ended up being Hermes, since they intentionally underdescribed him to not draw attention the first time around. So, later on, Hermes is, like every other character on this show, open to your interpretation and imagination. So once again, I’m going to imagine that he’s actually a transgender athlete who is angry about having their rights stripped away… I mean, George Clooney. I’m picturing George Clooney. On Disney Plus. In Percy Jackson. #DescribeEverything
A show that does have good audio description is criminal Record (Apple Plus), which is doing an excellent job of being both amazingly predictable and also highly interesting. those two things almost never go together, but even though I have yet to be surprised by anything, I’m super invested, and the audio description is excellent.
Also, The Crown (Netflix) has some excellent audio description. I saw recently that someone didn’t like the audio description because it was too interpretative, and reading far too much into the subtext of an acting or blocking choice. Part of the reason I am doing this is to help bridge the gap for blind users, and I cannot stress this enough, I have yet to see a film or television series that has too much audio description. incorrect, maybe, but complaining because something does toon much just misses the boat. We already have so much that isn’t in our audio description, that when a company/writer/narrator goes out of their way to bring as much detail as humanly possible in, even if it seems like stuff you didn’t need, or they are interpreting something, unless its wrong, it’s putting you that much closer to the experience of a sighted person. You might be focused on the subtext given behind a hug, but we also in that same shot are not given any direction of framing. Are they centered in the shot? Is it a close up, or more of a mid-range shot? What is the lighting like? Natural light? did they use color grading? How does the rule of thirds apply in this shot? Are there any extras mulling about in the frame? Is it day or night? Can you tell? What is he wearing? What is she wearing? What colors aware their hair? were we given previous context to their age or race, or did they not mention race because defaulting in audio description is real. Assume they are white unless otherwise told. Describe the use of makeup in this scene, as they are playing real people, and sighted audiences get to be critical about the makeup work and how close the team got an actor/actress to look like their real life counterpart. I could literally go on and on and on. But unless you are trampling dialogue, there is no way to actually give too much audio description.
Colin From Accounts (Paramount Plus) did an excellent job of describing a visual joke that featured a creepy old guy not actually masturbating, but doing something else that made it seem like he might be.
And lastly, The Trust (Netflix), hates women. That is the only conclusion I can come to, because it constantly shows the audience rather measured decisions being made, and then the women are absolutely losing their fucking minds. One girl was upset that some guy she just met didn’t rank her higher on his trustworthy list. As far as I can see, this is the second episode, and you guys met yesterday. And the one who initially brought up her race in the first episode about being a reason why it was triggering for her to be one whose vote didn’t count, and led the charge to eliminate the man who did it, is now angry because “why does everything have to be about me being black?” I mean this in the nicest way possible, but pick a lane. These women are the worst or best (depending on how you view reality TV shows) contestants ever. I’m not saying this is reflective of who they are as people, because a lot of this is editing, but don’t ever give the editors shit like this so they can use it to paint you like a crazy person, and the fact that they have mostly all the women being unhinged, while all the men seem super chill, is making me more than a little uncomfortable in the long run. I also realized, I only really remember the one girls race. No one else’s. So, in the editing, why are we making it about her race? People have got to remember they are on a reality show that does not care about them, and uses them for entertainment purposes only.
