This reminded me of something on 4chan about why the poster hated the series "Sherlock" and it could be summed up with "when dumb people try to write smart people they're indistinguishable from wizards." Competency is more pleasing to watch when you can also see the logical through-lines that the character goes through to take action.
To write a competend charakter you have to be competent yourselve in some areas. And modern writers are often extremely sheltered, have zero live experience and live in a media echo chamber. As a martial artist and former soldier, my supension of disbelief is so high in modern movies, that I often forget how bad the writing of most shows is.
@@westphalianstallion4293 you perfectly sums up how i feel about a lot of isekai manga, the sheer supension of disbelief required to put up with their shit is too tiring
@@zeshw1748 Brother Isekai is a great example. They don't want to live in a fantasy world, they want to live in a video game. That is psychologicaly so concerning.
I'm no expert on Japanese culture but there's something to be said about a conformist and hierarchical society with successful media about an unimportant person that escapes their world to become very powerful in another. @@westphalianstallion4293
“Because it has smart characters written stupidly. Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men is a smartly written smart character. When Chigurh kills a hotel room full of three people he books to room next door so he can examine it, finding which walls he can shoot through, where the light switch is, what sort of cover is there etc. This is a smart thing to do because Chigurh is a smart person who is written by another smart person who understands how smart people think. Were Sherlock Holmes to kill a hotel room full of three people. He'd enter using a secret door in the hotel that he read about in a book ten years ago. Hed throw peanuts at one guy causing nim to go into anaphylactic shock, as he nad deduced from a dartooard with a picture Or George Washington carver on it pinned to the wall that the man had a severe peanut allergy. The second man would then kill himself just according to plan as Sherlock had earlier deduced that him and the first man were homosexual lovers who couldn't live without eachother due to a faint scent of penis on each man's breath and a slight dilation of their pupils whenever they looked at each other. As for the third man, why Sherlock doesn't kill him at all. The third man removes his sunglasses and wig to reveal he actually WAS Sherlock the entire time. But Sherlock just entered through the Secret door and killed two people, how can there be two of him? The first Sherlock removes his mask to reveal he's actually Moriarty attempting to frame Sherlock for two murders. Sherlock however anticipated this, the two dead men stand up, they're undercover police officers, it was all a ruse. "But Sherlock!" Moriarty cries "That police officer blew his own head off, look at it, there's skull fragments on the wall, how is he fine now? How did you fake that?". Sherlock just winks at the screen, the end. This is retarded because Sherlock is a smart person written by a stupid person to whom smart people are indistinguishable from wizards.”
this is like 95% of the reason that I watch youtube videos, like random 3 hour video essays about random topics made by people who know an insane amount about said topic, its so fun because you can convince yourself you are being productive
@@joshuabushman7 Please come film a video in San Pedro, CA, location of 200+ films (including Chinatown, The Big Lebowski, A Few Good Men, Boyz N Da Hood & the original King Kong) as well as countless episodes of television series (like NCIS, Dead to Me, The Streets of San Francisco, Starsky & Hutch & Gilligan’s Island), music videos & commercials. Virtually ANY scene involving port authority warehouses, white sand beaches, rocky coastal cliffsides, military bases, quaint 1950s street scenes or car chase sequences involving jumping a drawbridge WERE filmed in San Pedro. We also have a post-apocalyptic-looking graffiti art location known as “Sunken City” which is a portion of Los Angeles that LITERALLY fell into the Pacific Ocean in the 1930s that looks a lot like the place you filmed this video, only way cooler. They’re about to demolish Jake LaMotta’s nightclub from Raging Bull in order to build affordable housing & someone ought to document it before it’s gone. That’s my pitch. Act on it if you will. ✌🏼
Brandon Sanderson really takes advantage of this in his books. Almost every good plan is actually explained, it's not just random stuff explained after the fact.
So true. I loved the story ark of the competent Bridgeman, forming a tight-knit battalion from basically dead men walking, in The Way of Kings. Competed character + a progression story ark is in my opinion some of the best shit fiction has to offer.
@@rico9163Exactly why I couldn’t finish “The Creator” when it came out. First movie I ever walked out on because everyone might as well have been written without common sense
@@pinkinthesushiholy shit i just remembered this movie exists omg literally the only movie that has made me full on fall asleep in the theatre I actually dont remember anything from it
I just stumbled on this video and dude…keep this up. You’ve got the perfect personality for this. It’s just the right mix of “bro intellect” and autistic attention to detail.
There's a manga series called "The Climber", about a maladjusted student looking for his place, and he finds it through mountain climbing. It's one of my favourite pieces of media ever. Just the way it tackles human relationships, isolationism, drive, will, and the desire to achieve something bigger than yourself, all through Mori Buntaro's journey of climbing mountains, and the sheer thrills I got from the beautiful art is something that I'll carry with me forever.
The original writer dies at the start of the series and the artist picks up the slack. The artist looks like he gets carte blanche creative freedom, from the shots to the character development. It's not what you'll expect but it will be wild.@@joshuabushman7
It was the Jason Bourne movies that made me realize there was a theme going here and that I liked it. Sure it's crazy spy stuff but at the same time it's clearly at a human level.
I think there’s a really fine line to where it’s humanly possible with some handwaving (Bourne and the initial Oceans) but when they start getting crazier unless they go full tilt John Wick where it’s almost funny, it has an uncanny valley where it doesn’t work Competence porn in tv or other longform is really hard
@@namedrop721 oh, the oceans movie were in this vein? Had no idea. I'm not sure I've ever experienced any sort of uncanny valley effect. Though I do agree that on the John Wick in addition to the sterility I also detect a bit of movie Magic that turns me off a bit. Or rather doesn't turn me on as much.
I know this is a series but peaky blinders has some amazing competency porn, especially when the protagonist is blindsided by his enemies and is pushed to the very limits of his capabilities
Don’t forget the “on the run” movies-The Fugitive with Harrison Ford comes to mind. Characters who have to live by their wits in an ongoing chase with a hyper-competent antagonist. First Blood (the first Rambo movie) also fits in there.
The first Terminator movie also has some of this, on both sides. Reese and Sarah improvising explosives, the Terminator repairing its arm, and the future scraps of humanity surviving and fighting back against literal doomsday machines.
I'm so glad someone actually coined a term for this because these are truly the best characters. These people are the characters I sniff out relentlessly and they're so hard to do. Great video!
It's not a movie, but I remember reading a classic book called Robinson Crusoe in school which really captures the feeling of "competency porn". It's a survival novel about the titular character being shipwrecked on an island, with tons of detailed scenes of him building stuff with the resources on hand. Very similar to The Martian or Cast Away, in that regard. It's awesome.
“The hatchet” was one I had to read in middle school, actually a pretty decent novel about a teenage boy struggling against the elements, as well as battling past trauma
@@TylerWardhahayeah no offense but the way its described here as if its like some obscure story, i think robinson crusoe, even if barely anyone’s read it nowadays, is still a very recognisable name and reference?? I might be wrong but ppl always use the reference, like Moby Dick, regardless of having read it
The Count of Monte Cristo is one of the classic examples of competency porn that also involves a prison escape, though I'm talking about the book. Haven't seen the 2002 Jim Caviezel/Guy Pearce movie.
The Bear is also precisely this. I've also noticed that a training arc gives me the competency boner too. The progress a character goes through so that ultimately they can show off their expertise at the end and reap the rewards is extremely satisfying.
@@denalinorsen6180totally , Real life already does the problem solving for the writer , so you don't really have to write it down , you just have to slap on some emotional conflict on and you're mostly done
@@s0ne01except it later came out he made most of it up, the doctor and lawyer parts especially and he only flew a couple times, mainly he just wrote and cashed fake checks irl
Arrival blew my mind the first time because movies very rarely surprise me anymore. I've watched it many times since, knowing what's happening, and I still love watching it for the exact reasons you mentioned. I've never played music, let alone been trained at a high level. So I didn't have that perspective when I watched Whiplash. I loved the movie but for me what really made it stand out was that at the end he was a much better drummer than he would have been if he'd had a different conductor. Was he happier or in a better mental state? Fuck no. At the end of the movie when you see him performing up to the basically impossible standards of the conductor and the conductor responds with actual support, at least during the performance, it's really conflicting. It's amazing to see him reach that level but you know it wasn't worth it.
honestly, I feel like this video perfectly explains why I like Dr. Stone so much. Senkuu does have an insane amount of background knowledge in physics and chemistry, but he uses actual fundamental principles of physics and chemistry to recreate modern technology, like radio transmitters and sulfonamides, and explains the process of creating such technology step by step
Such a good example. The series could've easily been 'brain magic' but since you are carried through the process step by step, it doesn't feel like it at all.
I honestly think you should make your own separate video detailing your critiques on Adam Neely’s vid. What you mentioned briefly was really compelling and I’d love to hear your in depth thoughts on what makes the film Whiplash special to you as a musician!
^^^^ this exactly. I put it on .75x speed for that whole section. Like the rest of the video is fantastic, & I love ur editing style, but I like adam neely. I used to watch a lot of his stuff. For the past like 5 years, I've been walking around thinking, "oh ya, whiplash isn't that perfect of a movie, actually🤓, cus it's innaccurate in ways that adam neely outlined & i dont really remember what he said but watch that video" Genuinely eye opening perspective, fr.
If anyone remembered the Adam Neely video, they should know that Adam was saying that this movie represents a real situation, but not in the New York Jazz Graduate level scene. He specifically showed that this was what happened in the highschool music education of a big music school, where the director came from. It is accurate, but not for the Jazz education depicted in the film.
Hi. I don't know who you are, this is the first video I've seen of yours but I can totally relate to that feeling you describe. It's wonderful to see someone who is insanely competent in their craft, proceed to do it, but ALSO to talk through what everything is or why they chose whatever. Even better if it has to be rectified on the fly. Like how you said in Ocean's Eleven. I love survival stuff, maybe it's because it's like so easy to find yourself winding up in that kind of situation. A sub-genre of horror that I especially love is when it's just that turned into a movie. People are trapped on a mountain or something. 0 points if they brought an entire kitchen with them, but a lot of points if they're able to overcome with minimal supplies or use things in creative ways. Some people already know this but for those that don't: In Castaway, he had to actually learn how to make a fire so when it finally happened that look of surprise and joy was real.
1:50 "I want to see their intelligence on display" so like the original Arthur Conan Doyle Sherlock stories then, lol. Agatha Christie as well. All the good old crime/mystery fiction was so well liked in it's day because they actually gave you the details required to solve the puzzle in the story, without making it obvious ofc but still solvable if you really thought about it, so when the protagonist figures it out you feel like you solved it together. For some reason BBCs Sherlock fucking ignored that whole thing and just gave him super powers though, past season 1 it's more and more of puzzles that don't make any sense to the viewer and Sherlock figuring it out with information we the viewer have no access to, so it's completely unsatisfying and self glorifying.
Yeah I agree. It’s kind of lazy writing for a character to just figure out a clue just by smelling the air or something. Just guide us through it to show that there is a process
Damn it, in the original Sherlock lore, there was a story with a plot-centric scene: Sherlock figures out the direction a bike went by looking at its trails on the wet ground. A Conan Doyle fan actually put that to a test, and after a series of trials figured that, in fact, a bicycle leaves the exact same trail on wet ground, no matter which direction it is going, uphill or downhill. The fan wrote a letter to Arthur Conan Doyle himself, informing of his discovery.. and the author actually replied with an apology for such inaccuracy. After going out with a bike himself, of course, doing his fair share of rides uphill and downhill - and figuring out that the trails were, in fact, identical. That is dedication.
@@michaelschneider8201That probably wouldn’t work today. Bike tires today have directional tread, so you’d be able to figure out what direction the bike was heading.
I'd kick myself if I didn't tell you about a hidden gem called "Mr in-between". The show focuses on titular main character Ray. By day, Ray is a seemingly insignificant, middle aged father. He walks his dog, takes his daughter to get ice cream and cares for his ageing brother. By night, Ray is a violent gun for hire, known as "the magician" for his ability to make people disappear. Watching Ray work is really something special. He relies on wisdom and ingenuity when he can but when he has to he will break people in seconds. All the action feels incredibly grounded and realistic. No 10 minute machine gun fights or over choreographed fight scenes here. Honestly though, I can't do the show justice. It's so much more than just a show about a hitman. A good 70% of it is just people talking about various things. It's absolutely filled with really profound and sometimes hilarious moments. You can find it on Hulu. 10/10
I watched No Country For Old Men for the first time this year and pretty much got the same exact feeling about it. I love seeing competent people battling against unfavourable odds. This video, unsurprisingly, got me thinking about similiar movies... -Han Solo in Empire Strikes Back -Collateral -Doc Holliday in Tombstone
Your comment on abuse in jazz music really resonated with me! I am in another creative field and the amount of times I have been reduced to tears and panic attacks by my tutor is crazy! The thing that keeps me in that environment is the prestige that my tutor holds. I really look up to him as a notable name in our field and enduring verbal abuse just kind of feels like something I have to get through to achieve greatness? I'm close to finishing my tutelage with him and moving into my own things and honestly, I'm not sure wether I have some kind of Stockholm syndrome or what but I don't really hold any animosity or negative feelings towards him. In that way, whiplash is a very accurate representation of the relationship between mentor and mentee.
If your tutor is verbally abusing you, and reducing you to tears and panic attacks, they are a genuinely bad tutor 100% guaranteed. Its one thing to push someone toward greatness. Its another to abuse them to get them to work obsessively, and hurt their mental health, which is more likely to hurt your progress and potential than it is to help you. Its a mistake to associate the progress you have made with the abusive teaching style. If youre naturally inclined to be good at something, you can excel even with a bad program. And you can make progress with a bad program, even if youre not a prodigy, just by being consistent over time. You could probably achieve more without the abuse, and a tutor that actually knows how to motivate people, than you have with the abuse. Id bet money on it. Its the one thing that i hate about whiplash. It ends seeming like everything turned out alright, fletcher didnt get any repercussions for his abuse, and andrew came out better because of fletcher. Im confident that fletcher ultimately made andrews life worse on the whole, and the progress he made in drumming skill, could have, and should have been achieved with a whole lot less stress and injury. Youre not fighting in a war. Youre making music. ART. The process of learning and playing music should bring joy to your life, not cause breakdowns. Its a good movie, and i enjoyed it, but fletcher is an actual psycho that has no place teaching anyone anything.
The comment above me is absolutely correct. Abuse/trauma doesn't just make you less efficient at work, it reduces your effectiveness in creative tasks and even lowers your IQ. The only situation where abuse "works" is manual labor and non-creative tasks, and it's still less effective than monetary rewards. (I don't have time to find the sources right now, but the Zoe Bee video about Motivation has a whole section with 10+ citations) So anyone who glorifies abuse is just admitting that they were treated like slaves and came out as less intelligent because of it 🤷🏽♂️
“How are you out of tune? You’re holding the damn tuner in your hand! What the hell is wrong with it?” He said calmly to the 13 year old. Spot on with the Stockholm syndrome. Of all the teachers I’ve had, my band teacher probably made the biggest contribution in how I was shaped to adulthood. I work in law enforcement now, and doing as I’m told when I’m told just hits the same feelings of an overqualified high school director yelling how to play a pentatonic with a class of 60 watching you just eat the abuse until you can do it perfectly. The simple smile and nod he gave before asking the next student to play whatever was selected without error felt better than any endearing words or compliments a classroom teacher would give; it felt like real respect.
@@ElectricAlien577 I was fact checking myself before commenting but apparently there's an interview with the director where he jokes that there should've been a post credits scene where Fletcher gives a eulogy at Andrew's funeral and calls him an ungrateful brat. Either way, it's basically off-screen canon that he becomes an empty shell of a person and dies young from an overdose
Yes! This is one of my favourite kinds of movies. Arrival and the Martian were instant favourites, because I loved following the technical and logical steps needed to resolve their conflict. I love the Martian book and Project Hail Mary even more because we can get even nerdier without the hollywood ending they gave the movie, hahah. Survival books like the Hatchet series also fall into a similar category where the character isn't actually competent at the start, but grows and learns and adapts to the point that he becomes able to survive comfortably and love (and respect) the thing that used to scare him.
You should watch North Face. It’s a German thriller/tragedy about a failed attempt at climbing the north face of the Eiger. The characters are at the top of their game the whole time, despite their hubris. And the visual effects are stunning.
"These are all very well-made films. Like most European films, they have adults who are grown-ups, not arrested adolescents. Mikael and Erika, his boss and lover, have earned the lines in their faces, and don't act like reckless action heroes. They make their danger feel so real to us that we realize the heroes of many action movies don't really believe they're in any danger at all." --- Roger Ebert about _The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest_ (2009).
The part of the Quiet Place kind of caught me off guard because I thought you were going to use it as an example of what not to do. Like that movie sticks in my head because of how dumb the characters were because they actively chose to live in a creaky old house in the middle of a field instead of near the waterfall. It wasn't even like a situation of it being explained why they couldn't live there or maybe they were trying to and there was an issue, but no it's just a part of the movie that just makes no sense and made me just feel the characters were really over engineering their survival when they could literally just live there
hard agree, the quiet place movies are the opposite of well-thought out worldbuilding, my single biggest wtf of the 1st movie is finding out the monsters are vulnerable to a particular sound frequency and can be killed with a shotgun when supposedly they managed to beat the world's militaries
establishing camp near the waterfall would have been worse than staying in the house because: 1) damp environment, and it would mean having to build shelter and relocate, also prepare the roads to get from there to the places where they usually get their food and supplies. the house is already near the silo and we saw the silo was almost full. plus, it already has everything they need. another plus, they already had emergency systems set up which would have been a nightmare to implement in an environment filled with nature they can't tear apart. 2) easier to monitor the surroundings. the flat surfaces surrounding the house mean they could just use sand to move around everywhere they need. it would be extremely difficult to replicate that in unbothered nature. especially since they wouldn't have been able to tear down the trees. plus, the house and silo act as places from where to see further distances and communicate with other people surviving in similar places 3) the loud noise camouflages them, but would also be like a lamp to the moths. the aliens would be more likely to go to that specific area, and the noise from the waterfall would cover those sounds. even if they were at a relative distance of the waterfall, i doubt they would be able to build a shelter strong enough to withstand the aliens or even big enough to properly hide. 4) living near a source of loud sounds would risk deafness for the hearing characters
Heat by Michael Mann. dude, you say you aren't the *biggest* fan of the "crime" genre but I would highly recommend Heat. It actually feels a bit more like Whiplash (with more prevelant themes of obsession applied to high competency, respect of trades/arts, etc) than it would feel to John Wick. Imagine if Oceans 11 was edited slowly, not set to upbeat, jazzy tracks and Robert De Niro is out here robbing banks. Sure it's a crime drama acknowledging some of the most base druges of society but it highlights some of the highest echelons of performance and competency in the criminal world. Plus it's larger scale than just Aton vs. the sheriff (also forgor his name) so there are some more interesting stakes that come with that. Love the vids as always
While I do like Heat as a whole I never understood why so many characters home life had to be included, I’m referring to the “oh no my fucken wife hates me” schtick. It just became comical for me at one point. Other than that it was great.
Michael Mann's stuff in general falls into this. Both his films and his TV work like in Miami Vice. He clearly values people who are masters of their craft, whether it's criminal in nature or not.
@@Blackmamba-ce3nb As does Collateral! Tom Cruise killed it as a ruthlessly efficient hitman, and Mann's excellent direction of gunfights really elevate all of these movies.
Just found this channel, and I’m calling it now, he’s eventually going to make 1 video that goes super viral, and it’ll bring this talented, smart, and funny creator the attention he deserves. Just gotta wait for the algorithm to pick up on it. Can’t wait to see more
Good movie, always makes me happier. However I think the movie sometimes overlooked or downplayed the day to day personal/systemic racism just to make audience feel better
@@thinkinyblinko6666It’s not entirely accurate to what the actual scientist women experienced, but they didn’t have a big problem with the film. I heard the book is more accurate, but I haven’t read it.
@@Sky-pv3njYep. Katherine said that barely anybody cared when she used the white bathroom and when one person complained, nobody paid attention. She didn’t even know there was a colored bathroom for years.
As someone who also used to be a drummer, i agree with all of your points about whiplash. That movie makes the marimba player inside of me very, very happy
Knowing the concept of competency porn makes it easier to explain why I like the manga Cipher Academy. It's a manga about deciphering Japanese ciphers and a lot of people complain that they can't solve to ciphers themselves before the characters do (most Japanese people can't solve them so it's especially bad for English readers), but to me the fun is in watching the characters solve them. Not only do I already like this sub-genre but knowing who the Author is and the subject matter I knew full well going in that watching the characters solve the puzzles was the only way to enjoy the series.
Exactly this. Seeing a character that is competent and motivated to get something done, and then they do it, is very enjoyable. It's a nice counterbalance or distraction from the many areas of life where something that should happen doesn't.
One of my favorite professional competency movies is "Margin Call". It is a good drama, and filled with hyper capable and ruthless cast, dealing with a high stakes situation.
i really liked tenets main character, he's both very competent and super out of his depth and then you get to go on a power trip with him once he does actually figure out how things work
The video was great!! Also i love the music you used in the background. Also very happy you mentioned at the end scavenger reign. I love this show really hope it doesn't get cancelled like so many have this year
Heat (1995) Robert De Niro as a master thief and Al Pacino as the hard boiled detective going after him. heights, shootouts, and tons of competency 10/10
Star Trek TNG is great compentency porn. Gene Roddenberry's mandate was that in an evolved future, Star Fleet members should be well-intentioned, highly competent at their jobs, and work well together with minimal interpersonal conflict. The conflict comes from outside sources and the problems they are trying to solve (in an intelligent, logical manner). It's really refreshing to watch something where the drama and plot shifts don't arise from the usual tropes of a character's emotions getting the better of them, making stupid decisions, or withholding crucial information from the others.
A competency-porn movie is a movie which the character does what a smart person (I) would do, not what is needed to drive the plot, or what is needed to evade something. An actual smart decision which is believable and makes sense, not a decision which is made because of the plot. So many movies happen cause of the plot, whereas competency-porn movies happen, and then the plot follows. Basically the opposite.
True, but that scene in the movie was still meant as a joke. But there's also no way he wouldn't enjoy snow crabs after years of tiny tasteless beach crabs.
The Martian Book is also very enjoyable for this same reason. Everyone is, or tries to be, efficient, because Mark's life is on the edge. Andy Weir (The Martian's author) has other books similar. My favourite one is "Project Hail Mary", where the protagonist is just a teacher thrown out in space. He's forced to come up with a lot of solutions and mechanisms on the spot.
The Northman kind of applies I think to this. It is historical and has vague mythological elements, but characters utilize everything they can to survive and accomplish their goals.
Thank you so much for mentioning Scavenger's Reign at the end, that made me so happy! That show is my favorite piece of visual storytelling ever. Awesome video!
Inside Man is probably the best example I can think of for this genre. The thieves and detectives are all highly competent and it’s a joy to watch the interplay between such smart characters
man i love it when people make content about a certain thing that's been on the back burner of your mind. it's like when you have a word that's on the tip of your tongue and someone finish it for you.
All the musicians I know love Whiplash and would probably agree that parts of it aren't all too far removed from reality. One of my relative wound up in a clinic after breaking off her studies at a musics school due to issues that were exacerbated by the stress produced by the school's climate.
2:56 One time I was hanging around with friends as a teenager in rural midwest. We went down a sketchy dirt road looking for something to do. Ended up at a train bridge very similar to where you're standing. It's middle of the night, we're probably quite stoned. We get out of our cars and start goofing off- someone starts a shoving match- guys just f ing around bored. Someone says, "hey, turn on your headlights, I just stepped in something..." Turns out the spot was some kind of unofficial county dump site for roadkill. We were wrestling on a heap of miscellaneous raccoon and possum carcasses. It was nasty. And, now I don't think I had any real reason to tell that...
This pairs up nicely with the Isekai genre too I think, you don't get that sense of larger-than-life thet would make it boring but you can still watch the people in the show see something orders of magnitudes more impressive. Like in Dr. Stone, you have a guy go from completely naked to building electrical lighting all the while the most advanced technology around him is a spear. It's insane. Also Ascendance of a Bookworm. A little more toned down progression tree but it still slamps ong
i'm not into isekai, but The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (also a bl) does have a bit of competency porn. a wage slave is accidentally transported to a magical world, and instead of enjoying retirement, he uses his experience as an accountant to fix the ill-managed national budget and expose some of the corruption going on. it's very interesting to see how he manages to marry the logic and rules of his original world (our world, i guess) to the more nebulous ones of the magical world he traveled into. it doesn't hurt that the story makes some very good critiques against toxic work culture as well.
SUMMIT OF THE GODS MENTIONED !!! WHOOOOOOOOOOOO 🎉🎉🎉 it made like, 2 entries at the box office I guess, like no one saw it except french animation nerds when it released, i'm so happy to see it recommended thank you !
I think a show you might like that is pure classic competency porn is MacGyver, the guy sticks the random objects together in a room to make a improvised explosive or a trap or a fire ect ect
It’s kinda similar to that satisfy feeling watching skilled craftsmen making something amazing whether it’s woodworking or blacksmithing or whatever craft or art.
Iiir Chef is about his experiences working with the MCU, how he directed this massive budget movie, and was burned out and just wanted to work on a wholesome indie movie (Similar to how the main character is an acclaimed Chef who transitions to cooking for a food truck)
Die Hard always gave me so much joy for this reason. The competency of the Protagonist AND the antagonist is what makes it the perfect Cat and Mouse movie experience it is. Hans is so well prepared, so calm in his ability to adapt and out-maneuver his opponents until the very last moment. He only makes one mistake, and that is to allow himself to enjoy his (reasonably assumed) victory a little too long. It's not Christmas until Hans falls from Nakatomi Plaza.
I can definitely recommend "Strategic Air Command" (1955). Very competent characters regularly doing hazardous things competently. Drama comes from real dilemmas, not stupidity.
Just recently found your channel. This was the first video I saw and my heart DROPPED when I saw you only had a couple videos up. Nonetheless, you are incredibly funny and I am learning things and the work you put into these videos is appreciated. Bless up, internet king
Video is such a random rant about power fantasy type movies and now I'm torn between thinking of my favorites that fall in your subgenre and wondering how you didn't get mugged while filming this.
Thank you for putting into words a feeling I couldn't describe for so long! I love this stuff. I think a scene you missed in John Wick (or maybe you haven't seen the sequels) is when he is being chased and there's a display case of revolvers but they are for show only so he breaks a few of them apart and puts different parts together to make a working gun. It shows survival, his weapon knowledge and skill. I was disapointed that he only used it to kill one person after all of the effort but I saw gun experts saying that it likely would have only fired once because of the different parts. Great video and thank you for the recommendations! Subbed
Personally, the show The Expanse sorta fits into this category to me. It's a book series/show where basically all the characters are very competent, and the problems they face individually or collectively are not caused by stupid decisions but instead are the kinds of things that they have to outsmart with political maneuvering or by 'working the problem' to stay alive in outer space.
The books, and surprisingly the show are so damn good. I didn't realize until watching this video what it was but I REALLY like competent characters, who's problems are actually intense, real problems and not just some stupid contrived situation that anybody with 2 braincells to rub together could deal with.
My personal pick for this kind of movie is a 2011 horror film "You're Next." Starts off as typical slasher flick where a bunch of masked killers breaks into a mansion to murder the family inside for...reasons. Only for it to turn out that the protagonist was raised by one of those crazy doom prepper types and is actually a secret badass with extensive combat and survival training who then spends the rest of the movie running circles around her would-be killers. I always had a liking for horror/thriller movies but the thing that I always annoyed me them most about them is the tired old trope of characters doing dumb things for the sake of plot. Seeing a character who actually knows what they're doing was a real nice breath of fresh air.
I'm 2 minutes into this and I gotta say - preliminary, this just feels like the difference between compelling storytelling and plot gimmicks. It's not a different genre - it's just some kind of objectively, universally narrative and character good practice 🙃 which is not more common because 1 - it's hard to pull off, takes a bit of effort, 2 - not all stories worth telling are equally compelling and interesting, and that's ok I will persevere to the end, see if this initial point of mine is maintained throughout
I just want to drop by here and say I had this initial thought as well - esp when he made the distinction that he didn’t really like conventional “bad ass” assassin/hitmen movies (Jason Bourne, Jack Reacher, etc) What I’m seeing is just a need for more a better establishment of/ a more even balancing between how harsh the enemy/environment can be to the protagonist compared to how the protagonist is pressured to adapt, within the limits of their knowledge and skills. TL;DR Yeah, I think it’s a storytelling thing too lol
Idk why I haven’t been subscribed, but I’ve watched 5 of the six videos on your channel just by the algorithm knowing I’m into each individual topic separately. 👌
Another sub genre here I’ve seen (at least in books) is the large scale war stories. There have been a few stories I’ve seen lately I’ve really appreciated where most of the characters are extremely competent. I’ve described them to others using the phrase, “Everybody knows what they are doing and don’t masks stupid mistakes.” Rather than the plot moving forward because someone is stupid and making huge mistakes, each faction is anticipating and adapting to the other in an intelligent way. The main example I’ve seen for this is Dune (more so in the book than the movie). You see the planning and competency of each group and how they anticipate each others’ competency. It makes the antagonist that much better because you know they wont lose because they monologue or singing stupid like that. And the conflict feels bigger because of it.
Tar is a great example of this, and I'm glad you brought it up. I have no clue about anything surrounding classical music, but I was glued to the screen throughout the whole film because it felt like the scriptwriters were competent and knew what they were talking about, and because the characters felt real and well-rounded (although I found the ending a bit underwhelming). Personally, my favorite genre of competency-porn has to go to detective and heist movies. Detective movies and shows are satisfying because you get to play along and try to solve the mystery by yourself (which especially pays off if you're right), and heist movies are incredibly satisfying because you get to see a bunch of specialized professionals pull off incredible maneuvers, so even if their deeds are immoral the payoff is huge
This is why I got into writing. I started discovering stories, games, shows, movies and music that seemed to understand the world on a deeper level than what gets mainstream play, like they cover a crazy amount of detail because they saw how it all interacts. Count of Monte Cristo is PEAK competancy porn. It's an amazing revenge story because that man performs his revenge like a composer of a grand orchestra, and every reveal that he pulls on his three friends that fucked him over is better than the last. Highly recommend the French miniseries with Depardieu as the lead if you dont wanna read the big ass book. The story is pretty simple but the details are what makes it amazing.
I feel like Attack on Titan is a great example of this. I don't think the show has a dumb character or moment and every fight or every conflict the characters are talking about what they have to do or why they can't do something because of the parameters of the battle. It is so refreshing to see competent characters solve a conflict or win a battle
Episode 3 from the Last of Us tv show gave me these kind of vibes. Watching Bill take over the freshly-abandoned town and create his defenses was great. Say what you will about the episode's impact on the wider narrative, but Bill's such a good skill-monkey character.
I think a lot of the satisfaction that comes from the "sub-genre" is because we are so used to movies making up stuff, not going to the details and just magically hand waiving things that when we see a case where they actually researched and put the effort into the details it feels much more immersive and authentic.
After i finished watching The Killer, I felt like I had a dexterity buff for like 12 hours afterwards. There's just something about watching a super competent dude work quickly with his hands that makes me feel so quick and fluid afterwards.
He messed up in every scene though, he fell asleep in the vantage point scene, he got the lawyers time before death wrong by a lot, he gets suprised in Florida and gets into the messy fight. I think people misunderstood that movie, he was not competent, he just made people think he was
@MoAtreides The movie explicitly hinted at his career being FLAWLESS. Everything he's ever done has always gone exactly as he planned. The movie starts with his first career mistake. It only gets messy afterwards because he's racing against time and he has opponents now. It's highly unorthodox as far as his occupation goes.
@@bornepayne242 we only think his career is flawless because that’s what his inner monologue tells us. And it’s the contradiction between his inner monologue and what actually happens which is shown throughout the movie. He’s just been lucky really. If you see at the end of the movie he doesn’t even acknowledge all his mistakes, he just goes on another monologue about how he’s competent
A show in this genre that I absolutely adore, although it is on the more unrealistic end, is Dr. STONE. It centres around a scientist stuck in a post apocalypse who uses his knowledge to not only survive but go way beyond that. It's very satisfying to watch because, even if it's unrealistic just how far he gets, each individual step he takes is something that could be done in the real world.
I am a professional Jazz musician. My opinion about Whiplash is that it is a fine movie that uses Jazz as one of the framing devices to tell its story. I agree with all of Adam's valid criticisms of the movie (and even some of the straw-grasping criticisms). I also agree with some of your arguments against Adam, mainly the fact that he should've just said that he wants Ratatouille but for Jazz. I think Adam just wanted to feel some more authenticity from the movie. I see your point about how a completely realistic depiction of Jazz would make for a less interesting movie, but I would like to raise a counter-argument. Think about how goated The Bear is. That amount of authenticity towards cooking is something I would love to see in a piece of media about Jazz. I'm glad we got Ratatouille for Jazz through the movie Soul, but I look forward to The Bear for Jazz.
This is a dumb generic early comment because i havent watched the video yet, but youre a cool guy Edit: alright i finished the video, it was pretty good and i thoroughly enjoyed it, if i had to say something though, the music choices sometimes didnt match really well with what was happening, like with some of the john wick segment. Sometimes the music was a little too loud but other than that, great video :D
Master and Commander is also a great example of this. Captain Jack Aubrey's insane familiarity with his ship, the Surprise, and making it adapt to all kinds of different situations is so fascinating to watch. The way he knows every rope and sail and how to use them for every kind of wind and naval action. Amadeus is also very fun. To see how composing is so difficult to Salieri, whereas Mozart is such a mad genius he effortlessly blends leitmotifs, symbolism, polyphony, and fugue and laughs while doing it.
Not trying to be that guy but The Professional (1994) needs to be on this list. That is one of the best movies of all time, and Leon is the ultimate competent character.
I wanna say something about the movie Soul. It's one of those movies for me where I'm bored in the theater, but can't stop thinking about it for days afterward, and I love that. I also like how well it portrayed the high level of stress he was experiencing during the performance without drawing attention to it. You could just feel his fingers twitching and the sweat pouring, but he throws himself into the music anyway.
This reminded me of something on 4chan about why the poster hated the series "Sherlock" and it could be summed up with "when dumb people try to write smart people they're indistinguishable from wizards."
Competency is more pleasing to watch when you can also see the logical through-lines that the character goes through to take action.
To write a competend charakter you have to be competent yourselve in some areas. And modern writers are often extremely sheltered, have zero live experience and live in a media echo chamber.
As a martial artist and former soldier, my supension of disbelief is so high in modern movies, that I often forget how bad the writing of most shows is.
@@westphalianstallion4293 you perfectly sums up how i feel about a lot of isekai manga, the sheer supension of disbelief required to put up with their shit is too tiring
@@zeshw1748 Brother Isekai is a great example. They don't want to live in a fantasy world, they want to live in a video game.
That is psychologicaly so concerning.
I'm no expert on Japanese culture but there's something to be said about a conformist and hierarchical society with successful media about an unimportant person that escapes their world to become very powerful in another. @@westphalianstallion4293
“Because it has smart characters written stupidly.
Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men is a smartly written smart character. When Chigurh kills a hotel room full of three people he books to room next door so he can examine it, finding which walls he can shoot through, where the light switch is, what sort of cover is there etc. This is a smart thing to do because Chigurh is a smart person who is written by another smart person who understands how smart people think.
Were Sherlock Holmes to kill a hotel room full of three people. He'd enter using a secret door in the hotel that he read about in a book ten
years ago. Hed throw peanuts at one guy causing nim to go into anaphylactic shock, as he nad deduced from a dartooard with a picture Or George Washington carver on it pinned to the wall that the man had a severe peanut allergy. The second man would then kill himself just according to plan as Sherlock had earlier deduced that him and the first man were homosexual lovers who couldn't live without eachother due to a faint scent of penis on each man's breath and a slight dilation of their pupils whenever they looked at each other. As for the third man, why Sherlock doesn't kill him at all. The third man removes his sunglasses and wig to reveal he actually WAS Sherlock the entire time. But Sherlock just entered through the Secret door and killed two people, how can there be two of him? The first Sherlock removes his mask to reveal he's actually Moriarty attempting to frame Sherlock for two murders. Sherlock however anticipated this, the two dead men stand up, they're undercover police officers, it was all a ruse. "But Sherlock!" Moriarty cries "That police officer blew his own head off, look at it, there's skull fragments on the wall, how is he fine now? How did you fake that?". Sherlock just winks at the screen, the end.
This is retarded because Sherlock is a smart person written by a stupid person to whom smart people are indistinguishable from wizards.”
this is like 95% of the reason that I watch youtube videos, like random 3 hour video essays about random topics made by people who know an insane amount about said topic, its so fun because you can convince yourself you are being productive
True. It might be a horrible addiction of mine it’s unhealthy lol
@@joshuabushman7 Please come film a video in San Pedro, CA, location of 200+ films (including Chinatown, The Big Lebowski, A Few Good Men, Boyz N Da Hood & the original King Kong) as well as countless episodes of television series (like NCIS, Dead to Me, The Streets of San Francisco, Starsky & Hutch & Gilligan’s Island), music videos & commercials.
Virtually ANY scene involving port authority warehouses, white sand beaches, rocky coastal cliffsides, military bases, quaint 1950s street scenes or car chase sequences involving jumping a drawbridge WERE filmed in San Pedro.
We also have a post-apocalyptic-looking graffiti art location known as “Sunken City” which is a portion of Los Angeles that LITERALLY fell into the Pacific Ocean in the 1930s that looks a lot like the place you filmed this video, only way cooler.
They’re about to demolish Jake LaMotta’s nightclub from Raging Bull in order to build affordable housing & someone ought to document it before it’s gone.
That’s my pitch. Act on it if you will. ✌🏼
Bro YES. ADHD ruins my life in ways no one can even imagine, but hell if I didn't felt myself being productive al 15:53 minutes of this video
@@edwardo_rojas_ adhd doesn't exist
I really dislike those that just read off Wikipedia and clearly don't have engagement/ commitment with the topic
Basically all of Mike’s montages in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are another good example
They turn crime into art
I'd say that Better Call Saul is almost entirely this.
Hell yeah. One of the best characters in TV
Not only Mike. Lalo, Ignacio, Walt and Jimmy too.
That whole show was competency porn.
Brandon Sanderson really takes advantage of this in his books. Almost every good plan is actually explained, it's not just random stuff explained after the fact.
So true. I loved the story ark of the competent Bridgeman, forming a tight-knit battalion from basically dead men walking, in The Way of Kings. Competed character + a progression story ark is in my opinion some of the best shit fiction has to offer.
@@bluefiim reading it right now its great.
Who would have thought that not having an aneurism from the characters' stupidity is actually nice
easily the biggest turn-off in any piece of media for me, when characters are just fucking stupid.
@@rico9163Exactly why I couldn’t finish “The Creator” when it came out. First movie I ever walked out on because everyone might as well have been written without common sense
@@pinkinthesushiholy shit i just remembered this movie exists omg literally the only movie that has made me full on fall asleep in the theatre I actually dont remember anything from it
I just stumbled on this video and dude…keep this up. You’ve got the perfect personality for this. It’s just the right mix of “bro intellect” and autistic attention to detail.
This is the greatest comment on this video so far ngl
@@joshuabushman7thanks, man!
@@joshuabushman7 Good editing too.
There's a manga series called "The Climber", about a maladjusted student looking for his place, and he finds it through mountain climbing.
It's one of my favourite pieces of media ever. Just the way it tackles human relationships, isolationism, drive, will, and the desire to achieve something bigger than yourself, all through Mori Buntaro's journey of climbing mountains, and the sheer thrills I got from the beautiful art is something that I'll carry with me forever.
I have never actually read a manga back to back but I might now
@@joshuabushman7 what do you mean back to back? as in you never read a manga period since you never fliped pages to the back?
@@NeostormXLMAX pretty sure it means finishing one
The climber fucked me up
The original writer dies at the start of the series and the artist picks up the slack. The artist looks like he gets carte blanche creative freedom, from the shots to the character development. It's not what you'll expect but it will be wild.@@joshuabushman7
It was the Jason Bourne movies that made me realize there was a theme going here and that I liked it. Sure it's crazy spy stuff but at the same time it's clearly at a human level.
I think there’s a really fine line to where it’s humanly possible with some handwaving (Bourne and the initial Oceans) but when they start getting crazier unless they go full tilt John Wick where it’s almost funny, it has an uncanny valley where it doesn’t work
Competence porn in tv or other longform is really hard
@@namedrop721 oh, the oceans movie were in this vein? Had no idea. I'm not sure I've ever experienced any sort of uncanny valley effect. Though I do agree that on the John Wick in addition to the sterility I also detect a bit of movie Magic that turns me off a bit. Or rather doesn't turn me on as much.
Pretty much any Tony Gilroy script has it. Bourne, Michael Clayton, Andor.
@@thatrandomnoob8611 Jesus ANOTHER huge selling point for Andor. Every thing I hear about it precision tuned to make me drool.
I know this is a series but peaky blinders has some amazing competency porn, especially when the protagonist is blindsided by his enemies and is pushed to the very limits of his capabilities
Oh agreed
Gay
@@rogerdoggett1991 the mother of yourself - yes
Great point.
Thanks for the recommendation. It was an awesome way to spend the weekend.
Hunt For Red October is two hours of people being good at their jobs and handling a stressful situation methodically
Don’t forget the “on the run” movies-The Fugitive with Harrison Ford comes to mind. Characters who have to live by their wits in an ongoing chase with a hyper-competent antagonist. First Blood (the first Rambo movie) also fits in there.
catch me if you can
The first Terminator movie also has some of this, on both sides. Reese and Sarah improvising explosives, the Terminator repairing its arm, and the future scraps of humanity surviving and fighting back against literal doomsday machines.
Wouldn't that be the survival catagory? Survive the hunt using your expertise
The Fugitive was especially awesome because both the protagonist and the antagonist were competent.
El Camino goes hard, the part where Jesse is tossing the apartment, or outwits the welder guys. My dick was so hard ngl
I'm so glad someone actually coined a term for this because these are truly the best characters. These people are the characters I sniff out relentlessly and they're so hard to do. Great video!
To be fair, this is a term that has been used for a while now. But getting a video on it is great.
its so refreshing to hear someone talking about things they like
It's not a movie, but I remember reading a classic book called Robinson Crusoe in school which really captures the feeling of "competency porn". It's a survival novel about the titular character being shipwrecked on an island, with tons of detailed scenes of him building stuff with the resources on hand. Very similar to The Martian or Cast Away, in that regard. It's awesome.
The Jules Verne book The Mysterious Island also has this in spades. It's probably my favorite castaway survival story.
That’s one of the best selling books of all time, and arguably the granddaddy of the modern novel.
“The hatchet” was one I had to read in middle school, actually a pretty decent novel about a teenage boy struggling against the elements, as well as battling past trauma
@@TylerWardhahayeah no offense but the way its described here as if its like some obscure story, i think robinson crusoe, even if barely anyone’s read it nowadays, is still a very recognisable name and reference?? I might be wrong but ppl always use the reference, like Moby Dick, regardless of having read it
@@GuineaPigEveryday No offense taken. In today's day in age probably not as read as much as used for a reference, I agree.
I think meticulous prison escape movies like escape from Alcatraz and a man escaped are perfect for this genre
also The Next Three Days came to my mind
The Inside Man
I just rewatched that the other day, It’s so good
Escape From Pretoria as well!
The Count of Monte Cristo is one of the classic examples of competency porn that also involves a prison escape, though I'm talking about the book. Haven't seen the 2002 Jim Caviezel/Guy Pearce movie.
The Bear is also precisely this.
I've also noticed that a training arc gives me the competency boner too. The progress a character goes through so that ultimately they can show off their expertise at the end and reap the rewards is extremely satisfying.
I’m not sure if it counts as Competency Porn, but Catch Me If You Can reminds me of your subgenre.
Oh definitely man
I think the best competency porn movies are ones based on real people like escape from alcotraz
@@denalinorsen6180totally ,
Real life already does the problem solving for the writer , so you don't really have to write it down , you just have to slap on some emotional conflict on and you're mostly done
@@davidegaruti2582yh, with a layer of "thid guy actually did all that shit...wtf"
@@s0ne01except it later came out he made most of it up, the doctor and lawyer parts especially and he only flew a couple times, mainly he just wrote and cashed fake checks irl
with the slight caveat that the actual man the film was based on was not nearly as successful as portrayed
Arrival blew my mind the first time because movies very rarely surprise me anymore. I've watched it many times since, knowing what's happening, and I still love watching it for the exact reasons you mentioned.
I've never played music, let alone been trained at a high level. So I didn't have that perspective when I watched Whiplash. I loved the movie but for me what really made it stand out was that at the end he was a much better drummer than he would have been if he'd had a different conductor. Was he happier or in a better mental state? Fuck no.
At the end of the movie when you see him performing up to the basically impossible standards of the conductor and the conductor responds with actual support, at least during the performance, it's really conflicting. It's amazing to see him reach that level but you know it wasn't worth it.
bro hasnt seen every movie 💀
The individual who is referred to as 'brother' has not yet articulated each and every possible verbal expression 💀
honestly, I feel like this video perfectly explains why I like Dr. Stone so much. Senkuu does have an insane amount of background knowledge in physics and chemistry, but he uses actual fundamental principles of physics and chemistry to recreate modern technology, like radio transmitters and sulfonamides, and explains the process of creating such technology step by step
Such a good example. The series could've easily been 'brain magic' but since you are carried through the process step by step, it doesn't feel like it at all.
I honestly think you should make your own separate video detailing your critiques on Adam Neely’s vid. What you mentioned briefly was really compelling and I’d love to hear your in depth thoughts on what makes the film Whiplash special to you as a musician!
Yeah, I'd totally watch this
Likewise!
^^^^ this exactly. I put it on .75x speed for that whole section. Like the rest of the video is fantastic, & I love ur editing style, but I like adam neely. I used to watch a lot of his stuff. For the past like 5 years, I've been walking around thinking, "oh ya, whiplash isn't that perfect of a movie, actually🤓, cus it's innaccurate in ways that adam neely outlined & i dont really remember what he said but watch that video"
Genuinely eye opening perspective, fr.
If anyone remembered the Adam Neely video, they should know that Adam was saying that this movie represents a real situation, but not in the New York Jazz Graduate level scene. He specifically showed that this was what happened in the highschool music education of a big music school, where the director came from. It is accurate, but not for the Jazz education depicted in the film.
@@WLxMusicyeah I actually love Adam’s videos so it shocks me when I see so many people who hate them
Hi. I don't know who you are, this is the first video I've seen of yours but I can totally relate to that feeling you describe. It's wonderful to see someone who is insanely competent in their craft, proceed to do it, but ALSO to talk through what everything is or why they chose whatever. Even better if it has to be rectified on the fly. Like how you said in Ocean's Eleven.
I love survival stuff, maybe it's because it's like so easy to find yourself winding up in that kind of situation. A sub-genre of horror that I especially love is when it's just that turned into a movie. People are trapped on a mountain or something. 0 points if they brought an entire kitchen with them, but a lot of points if they're able to overcome with minimal supplies or use things in creative ways.
Some people already know this but for those that don't: In Castaway, he had to actually learn how to make a fire so when it finally happened that look of surprise and joy was real.
1:50 "I want to see their intelligence on display" so like the original Arthur Conan Doyle Sherlock stories then, lol. Agatha Christie as well. All the good old crime/mystery fiction was so well liked in it's day because they actually gave you the details required to solve the puzzle in the story, without making it obvious ofc but still solvable if you really thought about it, so when the protagonist figures it out you feel like you solved it together.
For some reason BBCs Sherlock fucking ignored that whole thing and just gave him super powers though, past season 1 it's more and more of puzzles that don't make any sense to the viewer and Sherlock figuring it out with information we the viewer have no access to, so it's completely unsatisfying and self glorifying.
Yeah I agree. It’s kind of lazy writing for a character to just figure out a clue just by smelling the air or something. Just guide us through it to show that there is a process
Damn it, in the original Sherlock lore, there was a story with a plot-centric scene: Sherlock figures out the direction a bike went by looking at its trails on the wet ground. A Conan Doyle fan actually put that to a test, and after a series of trials figured that, in fact, a bicycle leaves the exact same trail on wet ground, no matter which direction it is going, uphill or downhill.
The fan wrote a letter to Arthur Conan Doyle himself, informing of his discovery.. and the author actually replied with an apology for such inaccuracy. After going out with a bike himself, of course, doing his fair share of rides uphill and downhill - and figuring out that the trails were, in fact, identical.
That is dedication.
@@michaelschneider8201That probably wouldn’t work today. Bike tires today have directional tread, so you’d be able to figure out what direction the bike was heading.
Soviet Sherlock Holmes interpretation and RDJ one stand out decently.
I'd kick myself if I didn't tell you about a hidden gem called "Mr in-between". The show focuses on titular main character Ray. By day, Ray is a seemingly insignificant, middle aged father. He walks his dog, takes his daughter to get ice cream and cares for his ageing brother. By night, Ray is a violent gun for hire, known as "the magician" for his ability to make people disappear. Watching Ray work is really something special. He relies on wisdom and ingenuity when he can but when he has to he will break people in seconds. All the action feels incredibly grounded and realistic. No 10 minute machine gun fights or over choreographed fight scenes here.
Honestly though, I can't do the show justice. It's so much more than just a show about a hitman. A good 70% of it is just people talking about various things. It's absolutely filled with really profound and sometimes hilarious moments.
You can find it on Hulu. 10/10
I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE this show! It is the most competent of competency porn EVER!
You could also put Karl Urban's _Dredd_ in that category, as everything he does is with surgical precision.
you definitely breathe through your mouth
@@chase5298 . . . So do you, and everyone else.
@@sinjinreed2091 🤓
Good comment
@@chase5298 🤡
I watched No Country For Old Men for the first time this year and pretty much got the same exact feeling about it. I love seeing competent people battling against unfavourable odds.
This video, unsurprisingly, got me thinking about similiar movies...
-Han Solo in Empire Strikes Back
-Collateral
-Doc Holliday in Tombstone
Your comment on abuse in jazz music really resonated with me! I am in another creative field and the amount of times I have been reduced to tears and panic attacks by my tutor is crazy! The thing that keeps me in that environment is the prestige that my tutor holds. I really look up to him as a notable name in our field and enduring verbal abuse just kind of feels like something I have to get through to achieve greatness? I'm close to finishing my tutelage with him and moving into my own things and honestly, I'm not sure wether I have some kind of Stockholm syndrome or what but I don't really hold any animosity or negative feelings towards him. In that way, whiplash is a very accurate representation of the relationship between mentor and mentee.
You said it better than I could
If your tutor is verbally abusing you, and reducing you to tears and panic attacks, they are a genuinely bad tutor 100% guaranteed. Its one thing to push someone toward greatness. Its another to abuse them to get them to work obsessively, and hurt their mental health, which is more likely to hurt your progress and potential than it is to help you. Its a mistake to associate the progress you have made with the abusive teaching style. If youre naturally inclined to be good at something, you can excel even with a bad program. And you can make progress with a bad program, even if youre not a prodigy, just by being consistent over time. You could probably achieve more without the abuse, and a tutor that actually knows how to motivate people, than you have with the abuse. Id bet money on it.
Its the one thing that i hate about whiplash. It ends seeming like everything turned out alright, fletcher didnt get any repercussions for his abuse, and andrew came out better because of fletcher. Im confident that fletcher ultimately made andrews life worse on the whole, and the progress he made in drumming skill, could have, and should have been achieved with a whole lot less stress and injury. Youre not fighting in a war. Youre making music. ART. The process of learning and playing music should bring joy to your life, not cause breakdowns.
Its a good movie, and i enjoyed it, but fletcher is an actual psycho that has no place teaching anyone anything.
The comment above me is absolutely correct. Abuse/trauma doesn't just make you less efficient at work, it reduces your effectiveness in creative tasks and even lowers your IQ.
The only situation where abuse "works" is manual labor and non-creative tasks, and it's still less effective than monetary rewards. (I don't have time to find the sources right now, but the Zoe Bee video about Motivation has a whole section with 10+ citations)
So anyone who glorifies abuse is just admitting that they were treated like slaves and came out as less intelligent because of it 🤷🏽♂️
“How are you out of tune? You’re holding the damn tuner in your hand! What the hell is wrong with it?” He said calmly to the 13 year old.
Spot on with the Stockholm syndrome. Of all the teachers I’ve had, my band teacher probably made the biggest contribution in how I was shaped to adulthood. I work in law enforcement now, and doing as I’m told when I’m told just hits the same feelings of an overqualified high school director yelling how to play a pentatonic with a class of 60 watching you just eat the abuse until you can do it perfectly. The simple smile and nod he gave before asking the next student to play whatever was selected without error felt better than any endearing words or compliments a classroom teacher would give; it felt like real respect.
@@ElectricAlien577 I was fact checking myself before commenting but apparently there's an interview with the director where he jokes that there should've been a post credits scene where Fletcher gives a eulogy at Andrew's funeral and calls him an ungrateful brat. Either way, it's basically off-screen canon that he becomes an empty shell of a person and dies young from an overdose
Yes! This is one of my favourite kinds of movies. Arrival and the Martian were instant favourites, because I loved following the technical and logical steps needed to resolve their conflict. I love the Martian book and Project Hail Mary even more because we can get even nerdier without the hollywood ending they gave the movie, hahah.
Survival books like the Hatchet series also fall into a similar category where the character isn't actually competent at the start, but grows and learns and adapts to the point that he becomes able to survive comfortably and love (and respect) the thing that used to scare him.
You should watch North Face. It’s a German thriller/tragedy about a failed attempt at climbing the north face of the Eiger. The characters are at the top of their game the whole time, despite their hubris. And the visual effects are stunning.
I actually remember having watched that movie. Wild to see it reappear after 14 years in the comment section of a TH-camr with 12k subs
"These are all very well-made films. Like most European films, they have adults who are grown-ups, not arrested adolescents. Mikael and Erika, his boss and lover, have earned the lines in their faces, and don't act like reckless action heroes. They make their danger feel so real to us that we realize the heroes of many action movies don't really believe they're in any danger at all."
--- Roger Ebert about _The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest_ (2009).
That music comment is incredibly accurate, except when they tried to be abusive to me i just left :) Not physically abusive, very verbally abusive.
Good for you. Certain abusive situations can make people trapped in it all, especially if it’s not first seen as abuse
The part of the Quiet Place kind of caught me off guard because I thought you were going to use it as an example of what not to do. Like that movie sticks in my head because of how dumb the characters were because they actively chose to live in a creaky old house in the middle of a field instead of near the waterfall. It wasn't even like a situation of it being explained why they couldn't live there or maybe they were trying to and there was an issue, but no it's just a part of the movie that just makes no sense and made me just feel the characters were really over engineering their survival when they could literally just live there
hard agree, the quiet place movies are the opposite of well-thought out worldbuilding, my single biggest wtf of the 1st movie is finding out the monsters are vulnerable to a particular sound frequency and can be killed with a shotgun when supposedly they managed to beat the world's militaries
establishing camp near the waterfall would have been worse than staying in the house because:
1) damp environment, and it would mean having to build shelter and relocate, also prepare the roads to get from there to the places where they usually get their food and supplies. the house is already near the silo and we saw the silo was almost full. plus, it already has everything they need. another plus, they already had emergency systems set up which would have been a nightmare to implement in an environment filled with nature they can't tear apart.
2) easier to monitor the surroundings. the flat surfaces surrounding the house mean they could just use sand to move around everywhere they need. it would be extremely difficult to replicate that in unbothered nature. especially since they wouldn't have been able to tear down the trees. plus, the house and silo act as places from where to see further distances and communicate with other people surviving in similar places
3) the loud noise camouflages them, but would also be like a lamp to the moths. the aliens would be more likely to go to that specific area, and the noise from the waterfall would cover those sounds. even if they were at a relative distance of the waterfall, i doubt they would be able to build a shelter strong enough to withstand the aliens or even big enough to properly hide.
4) living near a source of loud sounds would risk deafness for the hearing characters
Heat by Michael Mann. dude, you say you aren't the *biggest* fan of the "crime" genre but I would highly recommend Heat. It actually feels a bit more like Whiplash (with more prevelant themes of obsession applied to high competency, respect of trades/arts, etc) than it would feel to John Wick. Imagine if Oceans 11 was edited slowly, not set to upbeat, jazzy tracks and Robert De Niro is out here robbing banks. Sure it's a crime drama acknowledging some of the most base druges of society but it highlights some of the highest echelons of performance and competency in the criminal world. Plus it's larger scale than just Aton vs. the sheriff (also forgor his name) so there are some more interesting stakes that come with that. Love the vids as always
Thief by Michael Mann also falls into this category. It’s a must watch for anyone who liked Heat
heat is a badass film
While I do like Heat as a whole I never understood why so many characters home life had to be included, I’m referring to the “oh no my fucken wife hates me” schtick. It just became comical for me at one point. Other than that it was great.
Michael Mann's stuff in general falls into this. Both his films and his TV work like in Miami Vice. He clearly values people who are masters of their craft, whether it's criminal in nature or not.
@@Blackmamba-ce3nb As does Collateral! Tom Cruise killed it as a ruthlessly efficient hitman, and Mann's excellent direction of gunfights really elevate all of these movies.
Just found this channel, and I’m calling it now, he’s eventually going to make 1 video that goes super viral, and it’ll bring this talented, smart, and funny creator the attention he deserves. Just gotta wait for the algorithm to pick up on it. Can’t wait to see more
Gotta shoutout Hidden Figures as a super poignant example, too. Walked out of that movie feeling like my iq was 20 pts higher.
Good movie, always makes me happier. However I think the movie sometimes overlooked or downplayed the day to day personal/systemic racism just to make audience feel better
@@crosehl236yeah it did, but also the whole tearing down the bathroom sign scene was fiction
That movie is like 99% fictional dude.
@@thinkinyblinko6666It’s not entirely accurate to what the actual scientist women experienced, but they didn’t have a big problem with the film. I heard the book is more accurate, but I haven’t read it.
@@Sky-pv3njYep. Katherine said that barely anybody cared when she used the white bathroom and when one person complained, nobody paid attention. She didn’t even know there was a colored bathroom for years.
As someone who also used to be a drummer, i agree with all of your points about whiplash. That movie makes the marimba player inside of me very, very happy
Oh I used to play marimba all the time ughhhh. Never the best at 4 mallet tho
Knowing the concept of competency porn makes it easier to explain why I like the manga Cipher Academy. It's a manga about deciphering Japanese ciphers and a lot of people complain that they can't solve to ciphers themselves before the characters do (most Japanese people can't solve them so it's especially bad for English readers), but to me the fun is in watching the characters solve them. Not only do I already like this sub-genre but knowing who the Author is and the subject matter I knew full well going in that watching the characters solve the puzzles was the only way to enjoy the series.
Exactly this.
Seeing a character that is competent and motivated to get something done, and then they do it, is very enjoyable.
It's a nice counterbalance or distraction from the many areas of life where something that should happen doesn't.
One of my favorite professional competency movies is "Margin Call". It is a good drama, and filled with hyper capable and ruthless cast, dealing with a high stakes situation.
i really liked tenets main character, he's both very competent and super out of his depth and then you get to go on a power trip with him once he does actually figure out how things work
Casually tells Neil he needs 4 large vehicles for a heist, including a fire truck, and Neil's just like "ok" and gets it done.
@@VelocityLP its probably easier when the cia is backing you up on trying to save existence, but ur right and that doesnt make it anyless cool
The video was great!! Also i love the music you used in the background. Also very happy you mentioned at the end scavenger reign. I love this show really hope it doesn't get cancelled like so many have this year
Heat (1995) Robert De Niro as a master thief and Al Pacino as the hard boiled detective going after him. heights, shootouts, and tons of competency 10/10
I would also add The Thing (1982) to the list of survival movies
Star Trek TNG is great compentency porn. Gene Roddenberry's mandate was that in an evolved future, Star Fleet members should be well-intentioned, highly competent at their jobs, and work well together with minimal interpersonal conflict. The conflict comes from outside sources and the problems they are trying to solve (in an intelligent, logical manner).
It's really refreshing to watch something where the drama and plot shifts don't arise from the usual tropes of a character's emotions getting the better of them, making stupid decisions, or withholding crucial information from the others.
Subscribed. I love the format and you talking about completely unrelated shit for 5 minutes. Great video :)
A competency-porn movie is a movie which the character does what a smart person (I) would do, not what is needed to drive the plot, or what is needed to evade something. An actual smart decision which is believable and makes sense, not a decision which is made because of the plot. So many movies happen cause of the plot, whereas competency-porn movies happen, and then the plot follows. Basically the opposite.
top tier vid as always. editing on point, keeps your attention and it's funny. commentary is engaging. This man is going places‼
Appreciate it dawg
Man, instant subscription to this guy. I’m a sucker for this sort of content. I’m glad I discovered this channel.
Re: Castaway
Moving from one extreme diet to another can be very difficult for people's bodies. Rebuilding the gut biome takes time 👍
True, but that scene in the movie was still meant as a joke. But there's also no way he wouldn't enjoy snow crabs after years of tiny tasteless beach crabs.
The Martian Book is also very enjoyable for this same reason. Everyone is, or tries to be, efficient, because Mark's life is on the edge.
Andy Weir (The Martian's author) has other books similar.
My favourite one is "Project Hail Mary", where the protagonist is just a teacher thrown out in space. He's forced to come up with a lot of solutions and mechanisms on the spot.
Project Hail Mary is sooo good in audiobook format as well
Favorite audiobook
The Northman kind of applies I think to this. It is historical and has vague mythological elements, but characters utilize everything they can to survive and accomplish their goals.
Thank you so much for mentioning Scavenger's Reign at the end, that made me so happy! That show is my favorite piece of visual storytelling ever.
Awesome video!
Inside Man is probably the best example I can think of for this genre. The thieves and detectives are all highly competent and it’s a joy to watch the interplay between such smart characters
This was my best example of this kind of genre for years.
man i love it when people make content about a certain thing that's been on the back burner of your mind.
it's like when you have a word that's on the tip of your tongue and someone finish it for you.
Really nailed the editing man. Not too much going on, but enough to be more entertained throughout the whole vid. Good job
agreed, very good pacing for a guy talking into a mic with a very long cord by some crumbling infrastructure using low res memes for emphasis
All the musicians I know love Whiplash and would probably agree that parts of it aren't all too far removed from reality. One of my relative wound up in a clinic after breaking off her studies at a musics school due to issues that were exacerbated by the stress produced by the school's climate.
14:31 "least, but not last"
Look, I get this movie was made by french people, but damn.
2:56 One time I was hanging around with friends as a teenager in rural midwest. We went down a sketchy dirt road looking for something to do. Ended up at a train bridge very similar to where you're standing. It's middle of the night, we're probably quite stoned. We get out of our cars and start goofing off- someone starts a shoving match- guys just f ing around bored. Someone says, "hey, turn on your headlights, I just stepped in something..." Turns out the spot was some kind of unofficial county dump site for roadkill. We were wrestling on a heap of miscellaneous raccoon and possum carcasses. It was nasty. And, now I don't think I had any real reason to tell that...
That is genuinely one of the craziest stories I’ve ever heard. Thanks for sharing
This pairs up nicely with the Isekai genre too I think, you don't get that sense of larger-than-life thet would make it boring but you can still watch the people in the show see something orders of magnitudes more impressive.
Like in Dr. Stone, you have a guy go from completely naked to building electrical lighting all the while the most advanced technology around him is a spear. It's insane.
Also Ascendance of a Bookworm. A little more toned down progression tree but it still slamps ong
Idk if dr stone would be considered an Isekai
Fellow Ascendence of a bookworm fan! Pasta bless you.
i'm not into isekai, but The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (also a bl) does have a bit of competency porn. a wage slave is accidentally transported to a magical world, and instead of enjoying retirement, he uses his experience as an accountant to fix the ill-managed national budget and expose some of the corruption going on. it's very interesting to see how he manages to marry the logic and rules of his original world (our world, i guess) to the more nebulous ones of the magical world he traveled into. it doesn't hurt that the story makes some very good critiques against toxic work culture as well.
SUMMIT OF THE GODS MENTIONED !!! WHOOOOOOOOOOOO 🎉🎉🎉
it made like, 2 entries at the box office I guess, like no one saw it except french animation nerds when it released, i'm so happy to see it recommended thank you !
I think a show you might like that is pure classic competency porn is MacGyver, the guy sticks the random objects together in a room to make a improvised explosive or a trap or a fire ect ect
It’s kinda similar to that satisfy feeling watching skilled craftsmen making something amazing whether it’s woodworking or blacksmithing or whatever craft or art.
Chef is such a competency porn movie, even though it's a power fantasy for the director (which is also the main character)
Iiir Chef is about his experiences working with the MCU, how he directed this massive budget movie, and was burned out and just wanted to work on a wholesome indie movie (Similar to how the main character is an acclaimed Chef who transitions to cooking for a food truck)
Die Hard always gave me so much joy for this reason. The competency of the Protagonist AND the antagonist is what makes it the perfect Cat and Mouse movie experience it is. Hans is so well prepared, so calm in his ability to adapt and out-maneuver his opponents until the very last moment. He only makes one mistake, and that is to allow himself to enjoy his (reasonably assumed) victory a little too long.
It's not Christmas until Hans falls from Nakatomi Plaza.
this channel has immaculate vibes, can't wait to see more
I can definitely recommend "Strategic Air Command" (1955). Very competent characters regularly doing hazardous things competently. Drama comes from real dilemmas, not stupidity.
I would highly recommend the episode "Bad Travelling" from the series Love, Death, and Robots for a fantastic example of this.
It’s so good. I already made a video on love death and robots and mentioned it but yeah you right
Just recently found your channel. This was the first video I saw and my heart DROPPED when I saw you only had a couple videos up. Nonetheless, you are incredibly funny and I am learning things and the work you put into these videos is appreciated. Bless up, internet king
Video is such a random rant about power fantasy type movies and now I'm torn between thinking of my favorites that fall in your subgenre and wondering how you didn't get mugged while filming this.
Thank you for putting into words a feeling I couldn't describe for so long! I love this stuff.
I think a scene you missed in John Wick (or maybe you haven't seen the sequels) is when he is being chased and there's a display case of revolvers but they are for show only so he breaks a few of them apart and puts different parts together to make a working gun. It shows survival, his weapon knowledge and skill. I was disapointed that he only used it to kill one person after all of the effort but I saw gun experts saying that it likely would have only fired once because of the different parts.
Great video and thank you for the recommendations! Subbed
Personally, the show The Expanse sorta fits into this category to me. It's a book series/show where basically all the characters are very competent, and the problems they face individually or collectively are not caused by stupid decisions but instead are the kinds of things that they have to outsmart with political maneuvering or by 'working the problem' to stay alive in outer space.
The books, and surprisingly the show are so damn good. I didn't realize until watching this video what it was but I REALLY like competent characters, who's problems are actually intense, real problems and not just some stupid contrived situation that anybody with 2 braincells to rub together could deal with.
My personal pick for this kind of movie is a 2011 horror film "You're Next." Starts off as typical slasher flick where a bunch of masked killers breaks into a mansion to murder the family inside for...reasons. Only for it to turn out that the protagonist was raised by one of those crazy doom prepper types and is actually a secret badass with extensive combat and survival training who then spends the rest of the movie running circles around her would-be killers. I always had a liking for horror/thriller movies but the thing that I always annoyed me them most about them is the tired old trope of characters doing dumb things for the sake of plot. Seeing a character who actually knows what they're doing was a real nice breath of fresh air.
I'm 2 minutes into this and I gotta say - preliminary, this just feels like the difference between compelling storytelling and plot gimmicks. It's not a different genre - it's just some kind of objectively, universally narrative and character good practice 🙃 which is not more common because 1 - it's hard to pull off, takes a bit of effort, 2 - not all stories worth telling are equally compelling and interesting, and that's ok
I will persevere to the end, see if this initial point of mine is maintained throughout
I just want to drop by here and say I had this initial thought as well - esp when he made the distinction that he didn’t really like conventional “bad ass” assassin/hitmen movies (Jason Bourne, Jack Reacher, etc)
What I’m seeing is just a need for more a better establishment of/ a more even balancing between how harsh the enemy/environment can be to the protagonist compared to how the protagonist is pressured to adapt, within the limits of their knowledge and skills.
TL;DR Yeah, I think it’s a storytelling thing too lol
Idk why I haven’t been subscribed, but I’ve watched 5 of the six videos on your channel just by the algorithm knowing I’m into each individual topic separately. 👌
Hollow knight, club penguin, the editing, damn I vibe a lot
Another sub genre here I’ve seen (at least in books) is the large scale war stories. There have been a few stories I’ve seen lately I’ve really appreciated where most of the characters are extremely competent. I’ve described them to others using the phrase, “Everybody knows what they are doing and don’t masks stupid mistakes.” Rather than the plot moving forward because someone is stupid and making huge mistakes, each faction is anticipating and adapting to the other in an intelligent way.
The main example I’ve seen for this is Dune (more so in the book than the movie). You see the planning and competency of each group and how they anticipate each others’ competency.
It makes the antagonist that much better because you know they wont lose because they monologue or singing stupid like that. And the conflict feels bigger because of it.
FUCKING SCAVENGERS REIGN MENTIONED AAAAAAAAAAAA
Tar is a great example of this, and I'm glad you brought it up. I have no clue about anything surrounding classical music, but I was glued to the screen throughout the whole film because it felt like the scriptwriters were competent and knew what they were talking about, and because the characters felt real and well-rounded (although I found the ending a bit underwhelming).
Personally, my favorite genre of competency-porn has to go to detective and heist movies. Detective movies and shows are satisfying because you get to play along and try to solve the mystery by yourself (which especially pays off if you're right), and heist movies are incredibly satisfying because you get to see a bunch of specialized professionals pull off incredible maneuvers, so even if their deeds are immoral the payoff is huge
This is why I got into writing. I started discovering stories, games, shows, movies and music that seemed to understand the world on a deeper level than what gets mainstream play, like they cover a crazy amount of detail because they saw how it all interacts. Count of Monte Cristo is PEAK competancy porn. It's an amazing revenge story because that man performs his revenge like a composer of a grand orchestra, and every reveal that he pulls on his three friends that fucked him over is better than the last. Highly recommend the French miniseries with Depardieu as the lead if you dont wanna read the big ass book. The story is pretty simple but the details are what makes it amazing.
I feel like Attack on Titan is a great example of this. I don't think the show has a dumb character or moment and every fight or every conflict the characters are talking about what they have to do or why they can't do something because of the parameters of the battle. It is so refreshing to see competent characters solve a conflict or win a battle
Episode 3 from the Last of Us tv show gave me these kind of vibes. Watching Bill take over the freshly-abandoned town and create his defenses was great. Say what you will about the episode's impact on the wider narrative, but Bill's such a good skill-monkey character.
"guy with a mic rambling" is my new favorite genre of TH-cam video
I am so glad I got recommended this video cause I finally have a name for this weird genre that I love seeing
I think a lot of the satisfaction that comes from the "sub-genre" is because we are so used to movies making up stuff, not going to the details and just magically hand waiving things that when we see a case where they actually researched and put the effort into the details it feels much more immersive and authentic.
After i finished watching The Killer, I felt like I had a dexterity buff for like 12 hours afterwards. There's just something about watching a super competent dude work quickly with his hands that makes me feel so quick and fluid afterwards.
I felt like the main character was in fact really incompetent and did a poor job
@@duckieyoutube competence is literally his primary characteristic. That's why he's in the thumbnail lol
He messed up in every scene though, he fell asleep in the vantage point scene, he got the lawyers time before death wrong by a lot, he gets suprised in Florida and gets into the messy fight. I think people misunderstood that movie, he was not competent, he just made people think he was
@MoAtreides The movie explicitly hinted at his career being FLAWLESS. Everything he's ever done has always gone exactly as he planned. The movie starts with his first career mistake.
It only gets messy afterwards because he's racing against time and he has opponents now. It's highly unorthodox as far as his occupation goes.
@@bornepayne242 we only think his career is flawless because that’s what his inner monologue tells us. And it’s the contradiction between his inner monologue and what actually happens which is shown throughout the movie. He’s just been lucky really. If you see at the end of the movie he doesn’t even acknowledge all his mistakes, he just goes on another monologue about how he’s competent
A show in this genre that I absolutely adore, although it is on the more unrealistic end, is Dr. STONE. It centres around a scientist stuck in a post apocalypse who uses his knowledge to not only survive but go way beyond that. It's very satisfying to watch because, even if it's unrealistic just how far he gets, each individual step he takes is something that could be done in the real world.
Arrival is one of my favorite movies of all time im si glad you mentioned it
Thank You So Much for mentioning Summit of the Gods it is an amazing movie and I’m glad it’s getting recognized for its amazing art style and story
This video sorely misses the iconic "man with a very particular set of skills" scene excerpt.
I am a professional Jazz musician. My opinion about Whiplash is that it is a fine movie that uses Jazz as one of the framing devices to tell its story. I agree with all of Adam's valid criticisms of the movie (and even some of the straw-grasping criticisms). I also agree with some of your arguments against Adam, mainly the fact that he should've just said that he wants Ratatouille but for Jazz. I think Adam just wanted to feel some more authenticity from the movie. I see your point about how a completely realistic depiction of Jazz would make for a less interesting movie, but I would like to raise a counter-argument. Think about how goated The Bear is. That amount of authenticity towards cooking is something I would love to see in a piece of media about Jazz. I'm glad we got Ratatouille for Jazz through the movie Soul, but I look forward to The Bear for Jazz.
This is a dumb generic early comment because i havent watched the video yet, but youre a cool guy
Edit: alright i finished the video, it was pretty good and i thoroughly enjoyed it, if i had to say something though, the music choices sometimes didnt match really well with what was happening, like with some of the john wick segment. Sometimes the music was a little too loud but other than that, great video :D
holy shit. as a former classical violinist you absolutely nailed what makes Adam Neely's response to Whipslash so infuriating
Brilliant ass video essay
Master and Commander is also a great example of this. Captain Jack Aubrey's insane familiarity with his ship, the Surprise, and making it adapt to all kinds of different situations is so fascinating to watch. The way he knows every rope and sail and how to use them for every kind of wind and naval action.
Amadeus is also very fun. To see how composing is so difficult to Salieri, whereas Mozart is such a mad genius he effortlessly blends leitmotifs, symbolism, polyphony, and fugue and laughs while doing it.
Watching the ADHD man talk about some of my favorite movies while meandering IRL was very entertaining.
This is why villains have been my favorite since I was a kid. When done right they always use logic and are competent.
3:49 HOLLOW KNIGHT OST DETECTED!!! Love that game so damn much.
Yes!!!
Not trying to be that guy but The Professional (1994) needs to be on this list. That is one of the best movies of all time, and Leon is the ultimate competent character.
Yeah I love Leon so much. I was debating putting it on this list but I wanted to just keep the 3 popular ones
Blue Eye Samurai. The protagonist is so awesome to watch. Great supporting characters, too.
I wanna say something about the movie Soul. It's one of those movies for me where I'm bored in the theater, but can't stop thinking about it for days afterward, and I love that. I also like how well it portrayed the high level of stress he was experiencing during the performance without drawing attention to it. You could just feel his fingers twitching and the sweat pouring, but he throws himself into the music anyway.