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Post by Light Rises on Apr 3, 2005 17:02:13 GMT -5
That's all right; I'm personally more of a dog person myself (especially big dogs), but I can see where you're coming from. I still sometimes get nervous around certain dogs, though -- especially the ones that like to bark at people from the other side of a fence for no good reason. And those little "yippy" dogs can really get on my nerves, too.
~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Sept 5, 2005 22:46:55 GMT -5
The Prime Minister of Britain. *nod* Looking at photos of just about ANY old men in the buff = +_+ *glances at number of pages in this thread* ...Man, this thread just won't DIE!!! XD ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Aug 25, 2005 13:32:56 GMT -5
From my experience, once kids become preteens, ponytails don't seem all that "cute" anymore. THEN it just starts to get sorta, well, creepy. I did, though, wear them when I was very little. And THAT explains a lot. *cough*lackofcirculationtobrain*cough* ;D ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Jun 8, 2005 13:51:17 GMT -5
Yeah; those two most likely must have to have a face-to-face talk at some point, in order to help resolve things between them. They may think and decide whatever they want to about each other on their own, but I don't think that either Randall or Sulley are ever going to get past what's happened between them to the point of being able to move on with their lives unless they actually confront each other in the flesh.
~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on May 31, 2005 13:31:52 GMT -5
*cracks knuckles* Alrighty...first, the reason I figure why Sulley didn't think to "punish" Fungus as well was probably because -- from Sulley's perspective -- Fungus had served as Randall's "punching bag," and had been an "innocent" pawn in Waternoose's scheme (which would be ironic, since Randall was the main pawn, and the least in control of his own actions). If there was any sort of friendship between Randall and Fungus (as I suspect there was, although they probably weren't really aware of it), Sulley most likely wouldn't have picked up on it, just as it probably never occured to him to think about why Randall's behavior had changed so dramatically over the months leading up to the movie's events (since he ain't exactly the most perceptive guy, and these probably weren't matters he'd care about normally, since neither Randall nor Fungus most likely had ever been friends of his). So, since he'd been convinced at the time that Fungus was the only victim in the scheme of things, Sulley decided to offer him a "reward" for all the crap he apparently had to put up with. I DO agree with Cool, though, that after a while, seeing Fungus out there on the Laughfloor day in and day out might begin to seriously bug Sulley -- especially if he's starting to question whether throwing Randall into the Human World had been the right thing to do.
...Which leads me to why Sulley hasn't DONE anything in light of his guilt. It's a question I've seen brought up here several times before, and it's a very good one. But I think I've come across an explanation -- namely, that perhaps Sulley has been in a state of denial this entire time. Look at it this way: Sulley agrees to send Randall into exile, and in an act of vengeance goes through with it, right? But then once Sulley has had time to cool down (and once things in his life in general have died down enough to give him some time to think), he starts to second guess his actions regarding Randall. After all, he threw him through a door and into possible death because he was mad at him, and doing something like that just because you're MAD at someone isn't right, yes? But Sulley strikes me as someone who doesn't like to think he's capable of doing BAD things, and so he tries to convince himself that Randall "deserved" what he got, that he got a taste of his own medicine, blah blah blah ad nauseam. But this might not feel like good enough justification to Sulley after a little while...until two other factors are taken into account. Life's busy now; Sulley's the CEO of the largest power company in Monstropolis, and he's had to deal with adjusting to a high-responsibility managerial position as well as with overseeing the conversion to laugh power. So his mind is often occupied with other worries, and probably are welcome distractions whenever his wall of self-justification (chiefly, in regards to what he did to Randall) begins to crumble. And, of course, there's Mike...a guy who's probably relishing in all this new success that's come his and Sulley's way. We know, judging from their conversation in the Himalayas, that Sulley had felt sorry for allowing Mike's sense of happiness and security be "encroached" upon, so it wouldn't surprise me if Sulley STILL feels reluctant to bring up a subject that could potentially endanger that sense of happiness and security again out of guilt for what had happened the last time. And that's not even to mention the probability that Sulley knows that Mike's reaction to Sulley confessing his guilt towards what they did to Randall WOULDN'T be a good one. There's one last possible element, too: that if it ever crossed Sulley's mind that he should do something to rectify his actions, he might then try to brush it off by convincing himself that there's nothing he can really do. And that's especially true if -- in the back of his mind -- Sulley fears it's too late anyway, and that Randall might already be dead.
I do believe that, if Sulley comes to accept the fact that he did something very wrong, then he'd be willing to stand up for his convictions, even in front of Mike. But unless he's confronted with the reality of what he's done (since nothing else seems to be striking a deep enough chord with him thus far), I'm afraid that this vicious cycle of denial could continue for years to come.
~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on May 27, 2005 18:49:05 GMT -5
I've grown pretty fond of Fungus, too. Not quite sure why -- maybe it's because I relate to him to a certain extent, since I've been known to ramble on unnecessarily when I talk to people, especially when I'm thinking aloud to myself. And as a perfectionist, I DO have those "miss the big picture" moments and end up agonizing over little details that don't turn out to be of any consequence. I don't do either of these things nearly to the degree that Fungus takes them (I wouldn't forget to check to see if my computer is plugged in if it isn't working ), but I can still see a bit of myself in the little dude. Also, I just have the gut feeling that -- underneath his lack of common sense, his incoherence, his jitteryness -- that Fungus has a genuinely sweet soul.^^ And Yoda? He totally ROCKS. ;D I mean, how could you NOT appreciate a guy who makes reversed syntax sound so utterly cool? Yup, Frank Oz is an amazing guy; he was even a Muppeteer for a long time, if I'm not mistaken, and used to be in charge of Gonzo, no less (who, by the way, is the greatest Muppet ever. NO CONTEST! Although I like Rizzo the Rat, too... ). Check the machine, I will! Shutting up, I won't be. *ROTFL* Dude... ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Mar 1, 2005 15:19:22 GMT -5
You know, Sean, I think you might have really hit on something with that last statement. Finding his family, or at least PART of it, would have been motivation for Randall to accept the task of building the Scream Extractor. Think about it-to find a lost family member takes a LOT of time and money, and almost always involves having to hire a private detective, unless you have lots of free time on your hands to travel and do research. Private Eyes aren't cheap, either, and the longer it takes to find someone, and the more work they have to do to search for clues, the more money they charge, since they usually charge by the day or hour, even. If Randall had hired a private detective to locate a lost relative, say, his sister, for example, he would have incurred a really large dept pretty fast. He would have been in an urgent situation, with needing money to pay off the existing dept and continue the search, so when Waternoose approached with his proposal of building that machine, with the offer of a high-paying exec position in the company(which we all know he had no intention of delivering), this would have seemed like the answer to all of Randall's dreams. Not only would he make the needed money with his new position, but he would also stop Sulley from breaking Fangs McDonald's Scare Record, AND(or so he thought)gain some respect and much-needed self-esteem. It would have just seemed so easy at the time. If only he had known.... *nods* That's a definite possibility -- one I haven't considered all that much, but the logic behind it is so solid that I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes canon someday. Randall's need to find a lost family member would certainly further explain the sense of desperation we see from him during the movie. As for the forgiveness issue...I do have to agree with you, Sean and LG/Cool, on how difficult it would be for Randall to forgive Sulley and Mike, if he'd want to at all. Forgiving someone is one of THE single most difficult things to do, particularly if that someone hurt a person you love or deeply hurt you personally. Forgiving people like that (read="Fur Rug and Eyeball") would be EXTREMELY hard for Randall (to perhaps put it mildly), having in part to do with -- as you mentioned, Sean -- the fact that Randall comes across as a pretty stubborn guy (I have LOTS of people like that in my family, so from observation, I'm pretty sure Randall's that way too, lol). That said, I'd still like to think that Randall would someday find it in himself, once he's done some more growing up, to forgive Sulley and Mike -- sorta like that "I'm okay, you're okay" understanding between them that Pitbulllady mentioned when we were discussing Beboots' "Randall Guardian Angel" fic on the original board. Of course, the possibility is strong that Randall will never forgive them, even if revenge was never the be-all and end-all of Randall's existence after his exile, and rather something that was at the back of his mind, as LG suggested. Nonetheless...well, I guess I've just seen so many instances where people who were wronged hurt themselves more by not forgiving than those who wronged them, that I want to see Randall get past that at some point. Again, though, that's just my humble opinion, and I really appreciate your guys' honesty on the subject. *hugs all around* In regards to Avis' comment: No problemo, m'dear. *presents her with a pair of gloves*;D ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Feb 25, 2005 16:09:44 GMT -5
Hmm...*ponders a moment*
Y'know, it's interesting, because I think that different people react differently to certain personality types, which I guess might partly explain why I don't hate Sulley or Mike (and it's all right if some of you guys do; I'm not out to force my ideas on anyone, and I deeply respect your opinions as loyal Randall fans). A prime example of this outside of M.I. would be that while most people hate Jar Jar Binks from the Star Wars prequels with a passion, I know a few people who actually DO like him (my mom, for example). She didn't find Jar Jar annoying, maybe in sort of the same way that neither Sulley nor Mike annoy me. That doesn't make either me or the people who are annoyed by them wrong -- we just react to them differently, that's all.
I guess the BIGGER reason for my not hating Mike and Sulley is, well...it's best said through something my mom once told me, which I've since tried to take to heart: "Hate the sin, never the sinner," because we're all imperfect. I'm not saying that that's easy, because there are always going to be people who rub us the wrong way and/or just seem so out of line with our own beliefs that we seem to can't help but hate them. That being said -- and this is just my take on this, so you can take it or leave it -- I just don't like to think of almost anyone as a "hopeless case" when it comes to his/her ability to change for the better. Does Mike need a personality adjustment? Absolutely -- that boy needs a HUGE reality check on how much his attitude can and has hurt others, and pronto. *snaps fingers* There's certainly the possibility that he'll NEVER change, even if he's ever to truly hit "rock bottom" and see the writing on the wall as to how much it's his fault, but I'm not ruling out the possibility of his changing, either, slim though it may be. I know from experience that people can surprise you sometimes, and I believe that the capability of doing good as well as the capability of doing evil lies within all of us.
Perhaps I'm just an eternal idealist, as much as I like to see the good in people. But that's me, I guess. *bows respectfully*
~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Feb 19, 2005 4:52:30 GMT -5
*nods* Pretty much the sum of what I think on the subject. And it's funny to think -- unintentional on the filmmakers' part though it probably was -- how M.I. has ended up becoming a testament to the types of extreme things everyone's capable of doing in the right circumstances. Randall, Sulley, and Mike would all most likely be relatively harmless in normal situations, and that's a bit scary, in a way: how one "typically nice" and one "amusing" guy could suddenly believe it "okay" to be as vindictive as they thought their rival had been. Randall's reasons -- while not excuses -- were at least a heckuva lot better than Mike and Sulley's in terms of what each respective party had done to the other. Randall had been fighting for his survival; the Eyeball and Fur Rug wanted revenge. Motivations still matter here, and particularly when one side gets away with wrongdoing which was just as bad (if not worse) than the wrongdoing that was commited against them. We're talking about the supposed "good guys" here, after all.
So do I hate Sulley and Mike? Nah; they're deeply flawed, but certainly not evil. Am I angry at them for doing what they did to Randall, thinking at the moment that it was perfectly "okay," AND that they got away with it scott-free? Absolutely.
~Light Rises
P.S. - *gasps* Avis, you're not a "Lowly Dogsbody" anymore! w00t.
Getting sleepy...must go to bed now...*slinks away*
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Post by Light Rises on Mar 25, 2005 3:25:37 GMT -5
I actually don't think that Sullivan is that bad a guy. *braces herself for angry onslaught* I mean, he reminds me of some arrogant jerks that I know, and if I ever met him, I'd never become friends with him, but I do feel sorry for him, you know? But my sympathy for Sullivan pales in comparison to mine for Randall. He did some unjustifyable, but understandable things, under the circumstances. What Sullivan did was sort of like... not quite unjustifyable defence. That charge means you were defending yourself/others, but using unneccesary force. For example, killing someone because they tried to steal a lollypop from your child. So, I can see were Sullivan was coming from, bannishing Randall, but I think he could have neutralized the threat in a different way. Of course, the matters weren't helped much by Mike, egging him on. *nods* Actually, I DO agree with your conclusion that Sulley isn't that bad a guy. Me, personally, I could probably get along with Sulley all right, although -- in alignment with what pitbulllady said in the "Comments? Sure." thread some time back -- I'd probably give him the Mother of All Guilt Trips first. I don't know if I'd call him arrogant...he strikes me as more like someone whose tendency to "act before really thinking about what he's doing" sometimes brims over into big-time insensitivity towards others, as was certainly the case with his willingness to throw Randall into the Human World. It's even questionable whether Sulley was really defending himself at that point; in a way, Randall was ALREADY a neutralized threat, by virtue of the fact that Sulley had a pretty firm hold upon him and it was obvious that Randall no longer had the capability to escape from it. Now -- and this is purely from Sulley and Mike's POV -- did they have to do SOMETHING with Randall, to ensure (from their viewpoint, at least) that he didn't cause anymore trouble? Sure -- THAT I can understand. But if their concern in simply turning Randall in to the CDA was fear for what the CDA would consequently do to the two of them and to Boo, then what they SHOULD have done was return Boo to her door (Randall ain't goin' anywhere), THEN turn in Randall once she's safe. And, quite frankly, if Mike and Sulley had been "heroes" in the TRUE sense, they would've honorably dealt with the CDA and probable arrest instead of administering their own brand of vigilante justice upon Randall. It was SUPPOSED to be all about protecting Boo -- NOT about getting revenge and doing everything possible to get out of dealing with any real consequences for the bad choices they did make. I DO think that analogy you used, Beboots (about the child's lollipop) fits very well here, though. And yeah -- Mike's egging Sulley on most likely only exascerbated things once it came to "exile time" for Randall. ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Jun 20, 2005 16:06:09 GMT -5
I can definitely see Sulley being easily manipulated by what the overwhelming majority keeps telling him. His outlook on things appears to be fairly "black and white," and I have a feeling he hasn't had a whole lot of -- if any -- experience with deceitful, two-faced behavior. So after a while of almost everyone telling him that he's the best Scarer, and after a while of those numbers on the Scareboard seeming to tell him the same thing, it makes perfect sense for someone like Sulley to start believing those things sincerely, even if he had doubts about them at the very beginning.
Now Randall, to me, seems a bit more complicated in that area. As others have said, he's probably been told throughout his life that he'd never be a "somebody," that he was incapable of becoming even remotely successful. While I also see a determination in him that's been fighting these lies for many years (and I would attribute that to the theory that Randall once had loved ones who'd told him otherwise), there still seems to be a HUGE part of him that's started to believe what everyone else has told him -- that he IS a "loser," a "nobody," a "freak." Case in point: if Randall had possessed better self-esteem, and had had confidence in the fact that being fired by Waternoose and then having a supremely tough time finding a new job -- while awful and utterly unfair -- wasn't necessarily "the end of the road" for him, he probably wouldn't have went along with Waternoose's plans to build the SE in the first place. At the same time, Randall had been presented with a promise to prove himself a success, which was tempting to that part of him which was determined to defy what everyone kept saying about him. And -- interestingly enough -- another thing that might've added fuel to THAT fire was the revelation that Sulley's status as Top Scarer was bogus. As has been suggested, Randall probably figured out that Sulley's success wasn't just pure "beginner's luck," and that it MUST have something to do with the guy's relationship with Mr. CEO himself, who never liked Randall and wasn't afraid to show it. In a way, this might've been the one thing that Randall could point to and definitively say, "THAT I didn't fail in, because that guy's success was FIXED!" I still wonder, though, how often Randall let that logic win out, and how often he lapsed into believing that he really WAS a "loser," because a strong, overall opinion can often override even the clearest of facts and the best of rational thinking.
~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Oct 8, 2005 17:03:52 GMT -5
Me, personally, I don't like slash in the least (for mostly the same reasons that pitbulllady mentioned), although I won't begrudge those who enjoy it in a respectful manner. My biggest problem with it is that most slashers DON'T enjoy it respectfully -- rather, it's become an excuse to do something on the (at least) "soft-porn" side, which is especially aggravating in fandoms that were more geared toward a family- or child-oriented audience in the first place. I have to agree the joke you played IS sorta funny, FONY, but it also saddens me a bit, too, because it also shows how easily kids' minds tend to go straight in the gutter these days simply through the power of suggestion. So, yeah, I understand it was just a joke, but it still saddens me somewhat all the same (which isn't your fault at all ). And, honestly (to use a prime example from the "Lilo & Stitch" fandom), I never, EVER would've considered Jumba and Pleakley "a couple" outside of suggestions made via fanfiction. I feel the same way about Mike and Sulley -- I just DON'T see it happenin'. ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Feb 18, 2005 16:52:34 GMT -5
I thought, "Here's a guy who has it rough...much rougher than he deserves. He's ambitious and hardworking but always outshined, he's abused by his employer....etc etc etc..." His actions make it easy to label him 'villain,' but do they really correspond to how he truly feels? Essentially, he seemed like he just needed a hug. And that always gets me. I wanted to make him feel understood and appreciated. I thought, there must be so many real people just like him. No, he's not perfect, but he's no bad guy either. And he certainly didn't deserve what he got in the end. *applaudes* ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Feb 18, 2005 14:12:13 GMT -5
Y'know, it's funny, because for me it was sort of a "delayed reaction." When I saw M.I. for the first time, I was just soaking everything in -- watching it for pure entertainment, and not really letting anything come across my thoughts until the credits started rolling. Once my folks and I left the theater, though, and we were walking back to our hotel (we were out of town that weekend), my mind kept on backtracking the most -- out of all the characters -- to Randall. Something just...well, something just didn't feel completely RIGHT to me about him being the "villain." I'm usually a big "hero" supporter, so this was definitely away from the norm for me. But as I thought more about it, I grew more and more convinced that Randall wasn't evil at all -- more like a regular guy who'd made some huge mistakes, and had probably gone through some really rough times in the past. Now here's the striking part: Randall was the first antagonist from ANY story I'd seen or read whom I thought was truly deserving of a second chance, and this was WAY before I joined the original Boggs' Board or even knew there was such a fandom following for him. My only other guess as to why I was so drawn to him at first is my longtime affinity for reptilian characters (sentient or not). But that's about it, in terms of any specifics. Not that I'm complaining. ~Light Rises
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Post by Light Rises on Feb 18, 2005 13:30:42 GMT -5
Hmm...that's a toughie, because -- at least from my experience -- it's hard to tell how people will react, especially once you start explaining to them all the logic behind Randall not being "evil"/the real "bad guy" in M.I. The thing is, you're always going to have people who'll respond with, "Dude, it's just a movie/cartoon," and say you're just looking way too much into it. I've only had one close friend whom I was able to convince about our claims, and I've had a couple other friends who respected my affinity for Randall, but didn't necessarily buy into my reasoning for it. The best advice I can offer is that, whenever you're asked about why you like Randall, you respond with something like what Sean suggested. If they then seem honestly interested in further elaboration, you can start off with the most obvious bits of logic (like the fact that Randall was only on-screen for 20 minutes of the movie; that we only saw whatever Mike or Sulley saw of him [except for one brief scene]; and that 98% of the movie takes place over only TWO DAYS, which thus makes it kinda hard to judge him as a person). Then you can get into the deeper stuff, if whoever you're speaking with is still receptive. But, yeah...*shrugs* It's still a coin toss, whether they'll end up agreeing with you or not. Hope that helps. ~Light Rises
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