Objectivity and Subjectivity

The distinction between **subjectivity** and **objectivity** is a basic idea of philosophy, particularly epistemology and metaphysics

* Something is **subjective** if it is dependent on a mind (biases, perception, emotions, opinions, imagination, or conscious experience). If a claim is true exclusively when considering the claim from the viewpoint of a sentient being, it is subjectively true. One person may consider the weather to be pleasantly warm, and another person may consider the same weather to be too hot; both views are subjective. The word *subjectivity* comes from *subject* in a philosophical sense, meaning an individual who possesses unique conscious experiences, such as perspectives, feelings, beliefs, and desires, or who (consciously) acts upon or wields power over some other entity (an *object*)
* Something is **objective** if it can be confirmed independent of a mind. If a claim is true even when considering it outside the viewpoint of a sentient being, then it is labeled objectively true. Scientific objectivity is practicing science while intentionally reducing partiality, biases, or external influences. Journalistic objectivity is the reporting of facts and news with minimal personal bias or in an impartial or politically neutral manner

The EFAP Podcast has taken a look at the topic of objectivity and subjectivity in regards to analyzing stories in particular, and have come across many different film video essayist's views on whether or not judging films objectively is possible

## **Patrick Willems**

In EFAP 2, Patrick Willems did not make reference to the words "objective" or "subjective," but did disavow the idea that stories have to make sense logically, because humans are not logical, contrasting them against the Vulcans from *Star Trek*, who he considered proof that to act logically is to not be human. He argued that characters behaving logically would lead to a lack of conflict and therefore be boring, despite having just referenced the Vulcans, who act logically and engage in conflict. Patrick did concede people could care about plot holes all the want but that they should not say they are genuine flaws, seemingly differentiating the subjective from the objective. Later on, however, he infamously claimed people who notice plot holes are "watching movies wrong," because thinking about plot holes disengages the viewer from the story. MauLer could not help but wonder if Patrick agrees plot holes disengage people from movies, and knows that there are people who think about plot holes, then how can he blame people for being disengaged by movies with plot holes in them?

At one point the gang read a comment on Patrick's video, who thanked Patrick profusely for standing up against plot hole talk, and bemoaned the fact that MauLer had made a five-hour critique of *The Last Jedi*, accusing him of spending the whole video focusing only on plot holes and arguing any other way of viewing the film doesn't matter, something MauLer did not, in fact, do. This accusation became even more awkward when Patrick himself would indeed say that certain people are watching movies wrong, and the things they value in filmmaking don't matter. The commenter then proclaimed that there is no objective way to view a film, and went even further to say that is the reason why film has any value in the first place, somehow of the belief that something would have no value if you could determine its value. They then argued that if there was a way to judge art objectively, it would actually be the opposite of what MauLer thinks, since plot consistency is inconsequential, a conclusion they were somehow able to come to even though doing so is apparently impossible

## **MovieBob**

EFAP 6 saw MovieBob attempt to bolster Patrick's video with one of his own, reiterating the claim that focusing on the logical consistency of a story is the wrong way to view it because it distracts from the movie focusing on the correct goal of making a "satisfying and lasting experience," as if the two are mutually exclusive. Much like Patrick, Bob scoffed at the idea of nitpicking movies when he himself had done similar to more acceptable targets like *Batman V Superman*, argued logic does not matter in movies while defending movies from criticism using logic, and accused others of trying to invalidate people's opinions while doing the same himself. Bob did reference objectivity directly, arguing objective facts about a work of fiction could not be known since it is impossible to scientifically deduce whether Superman is stronger than Captain Marvel or Kirk is a better captain than Picard, despite the fact that the force of a punch can literally be measured and two characters' accomplishments can be compared against each other. He concluded that people who claim to be objective are actually dressing up their subjective opinion to avoid being criticized, because if they were scrutinized people would realize that they are racist. He demonstrated this by mixing in direct quotes from MauLer's *Black Panther* review with a claim that racism doesn't exist, something MauLer never said, which if anything should act as proof that MauLer's criticisms were actually legitimate since the actual MauLer quotes were used as the example of good criticisms that were used to cover up the racism, while the racism had to be made up by Bob himself

## **Quinton Reviews**

Quinton Reviews took quite some issue with MauLer's claim that a story can be judged objectively, and rather than talk to him about it or make his own video on it, he decided to insert his thoughts into one of The Right Opinion's videos, which MauLer, Rags, and Wolf took a look at in EFAPs 8 and 9. He considered a review to be nothing more than a description of an experience, because back in the day people reviewed plays instead of movies, while Rags and MauLer found this reductive, figuring that a review could be just that but could also be a multitude of other things. Quinton concluded that there is no way to measure art's worth since it is not a science, and that that is arguably the only reason why art has any value in the first place, raising the question of if this would not mean that science has no value. Quinton used a clip of Rags calling *The Last Jedi* an "objectively poorly-made film" as evidence that Rags will not allow other people to disagree with him because his opinions are objective whereas everyone else's are subjective, in contrast with Rags having outright said that it is okay to like the movie, with MauLer adding that judging something objectively is not meant to replace doing so subjectively, as you can do both. Quinton questioned what MauLer and Rags even considered to be "objective values," something he could have found out if he had talked to them, and asked more importantly, what made subjective values "factually worse," something MauLer and Rags never said. His proof that they thought this was a screenshot of MauLer saying that subjectivity and objectivity are different from one another, and a clip of MauLer saying that if you think *The Last Jedi* is great, good luck calling anything bad. MauLer stood by this, arguing that just about anything that a movie could be called bad for is contained within *The Last Jedi*, but that that is different from someone *liking* the film and *disliking* another, since nobody requires any justification to like what they like. Quinton deemed it ridiculous to deem MauLer and Rags' criticisms of *The Last Jedi* objective because they were mostly just "thoughts about the lore and nitpicks about dialogue," an already reductive statement made stranger by the fact that nitpicks by their nature are small, but correct - an incorrect criticism would not be a nitpick, it would just be wrong - as well as raising the question of how he could consider it ridiculous to consider nitpicks objective as opposed to anything else when he doesn't believe anything is objective at all in the first place. He described his goal as being to disagree with Rags to prove Rags is not objective because he can be disagreed with, and deemed MauLer and Rags' "thesis statement" to be toxic... in his subjective opinion, and informed MauLer and Rags that they are not holy warriors and are actually just movie reviewers, something they already knew. Quinton also interpreted Rags' jab at toy sales as meaning Rags thinks a movie is objectively without value if it sold toys

## **Joseph Anderson**

Joseph Anderson famously claimed that *SOMA* is not a horror game because it never scared him, MauLer finding it baffling that he would declare something to categorically be an entirely different thing because of his own personal emotional response to it. This was made even stranger in EFAP 11 when Anderson made it known that horror games, in contrast with horror movies, do not ever scare him at all, raising the question of how him not being scared by *SOMA* in particular made him deem it to be in a separate category from horror games when it got no less of a fear response out of him than any other horror game. Thankfully, he covered himself by making it known that this video was just his opinion. In EFAP 16, he would go on to say that it should simply be inferred that anything he, or any other video essayist, says is just their opinion, as that is implied

## **Oscar Isaac**

In an interview for *The Force Awakens*, Oscar Isaac was asked to rank his favorite *Star Wars* movies, and chose *Return of the Jedi* as his favorite. When the interviewer was intrigued by him placing *Jedi* above *The Empire Strikes Back*, Isaac explained "I recognize that *Empire Strikes Back* is a better film, but for me, I can't divorce my emotional response to *Return of the Jedi*, even the Ewoks, everything about it is uh- you know I have a very personal connection to the memories that it elicits." MauLer included this clip towards the end of Part 1 of his Critique of *The Force Awakens* as a positive example of someone distinguishing their objective read of a movie from their subjective one

## **Jack Saint**

Jack Saint also held the belief that MauLer simply calls his own subjective opinions objective and that he does not believe other people's opinions are valid or are capable of being correct about movies, as seen in EFAPs 22 and 23. He used a clip of MauLer saying *Infinity War* has plenty of flaws in it that would likely make it objectively about a 5 or 6 out of 10 to contradict him calling *Infinity War* an objectively good movie, which MauLer never actually did. Jack criticized MauLer for not looking at movies through other lenses as well such as Marxist or post-colonialist lenses, claiming that he would sometimes look at movies through a feminist lens to accuse female characters of being Mary Sues, despite MauLer having called Han Solo a Mary Sue as well in his review of *Solo*, which Jack had seen. Naturally, he also implied MauLer did not like Shuri from *Black Panther* because she was black. He accused MauLer of forgetting that ”perspectives are perspectives, even if they are based on the same objective thing,” not realizing that that statement itself implied that both objective and subjective analyses exist and are two different things, and contrasted his critiques against "real, in-depth, nitty-gritty critique," raising the question of what differentiated one from the other if all critique is subjective anyway

## **AJCarabello95**

While not using the words "objective" or "subjective" himself, AJCarabello did proclaim that the *Star Wars* fandom was full of "different but equally beautiful opinions" in EFAP 29. Despite this, he would go on to deride people as toxic and entitled merely for making negative reviews of a *Star Wars* movie, and likened them to people who harassed the cast and crew

### John Adams

It was discovered during that same stream that John "Spider" Adams, Founding Father and second President of the United States, had used his clairvoyant powers to inscribe within the American Constitution the lesser-known 77th Amendment, which gave all men the right to like *The Last Jedi*

## **HiTop Films**

HiTop Films prefaced his criticism of *Spider-Man Homecoming* with the disclaimer that it was all just his opinion, MauLer being perfectly fine with him having whatever opinion on the film he wanted, but taking issue with making objective claims that were inaccurate, like claiming Peter never faced any consequences in the movie when he did. His further proclamation that "Art. Is. Subjective" in that same video was made awkward by a clip the gang watched in EFAP 85, where he informed anyone who found *Daredevil* boring that they are objectively wrong. When this was brought to his attention, HiTop clarified that he had grown and changed since then.

HiTop would go on to proclaim that he "does not believe in bad" in EFAP 136, though he admitted that he still uses the word "bad" too much. Within that very same week, HiTop tweeted that catching up on *Hulk* comics reminded him of how bad the MCU's adaptation of the Hulk was

## **Just Write**

Just Write made a full video dedicated to the topic, claiming that deeming media to be objectively good or bad was damaging to film discussion. The gang took a look at this video in EFAP 47, which resident guy-who-knows-about-philosophy Theo prefaced by pointing out that Kant's *The Critique of Judgment*, which Just Write references, was written 200 years ago, asking the panel if they thought it had gone entirely unchallenged in the time since. Southpaw brought up the hypothetical conversation brought up in the Just Write debate where someone who considers a film objectively good and someone who considers the same film objectively bad don't change each other's minds at the end of the conversation but come away from it having still learned something, finding it funny that that hypothetical had in a way predicted the recent debate with Renns Reviews on *Jurassic World*.

Just Write claimed the only objective things about a movie are basic facts like "George Lucas wrote this," and you enter the realm of subjectivity the moment you say things like "Lucas is a brilliant writer" or "Luke is well-written," and anyone calling a film objectively good or bad is trying to present their opinion as fact. He presented critics who consider themselves objective as writing off subjective critics as only caring about feelings as opposed to dealing with tangible facts. MauLer responded that he had no issue with someone simply stating their opinion on a film, since it would be absurd for him to argue to someone that they don't feel a feeling, but the issue comes when people use "just an opinion" as a shield against being corrected on something objectively wrong, citing the aforementioned HiTop example. He added on that he also doubts most people watch a review to simply get someone's feelings on a movie, and want to hear the arguments as to *why* they feel that way.

Just Write argued that using objective facts from the film, one person could interpret *Star Wars* as having the theme of nature vs technology, since Luke foregoes the targeting computer to destroy the technologically-advanced Death Star, while someone else could argue the theme is atheism vs religion (which Theo pointed out does not even contradict the possibility of it being about nature vs technology), and while both of those are not influenced by emotions (the definition of objective), they are not objective, since they show their subjective perspectives. MauLer agreed that people can cherrypick movies to find a theme, but that is part of what he takes issue with, people being less than fully honest to push an idea, pointing out that Just Write's own examples were flimsy since Luke still used technology to defeat the Empire in the form of a spaceship and a missile, with Wolf adding that Vader was equally as "religious" as Luke was, and the clip Just Write used to portray the "atheistic" Empire was of Vader proving the Force was real to them. Theo differentiated these as readings pulling interpretations rather than an analysis of the content itself, and that even amongst interpretations there can be strong and weak interpretations, adding that the media you consumed has to factor in at some point, otherwise why even reference the media. MauLer contrasted Just Write's examples that had one faulty reference each against the argument that *The Last Jedi* failed at portraying its theme, since the film has Yoda state its moral of "failure is the greatest teacher" overtly, and the events depicted in the film have characters not learning from failure.

Just Write cited the philosopher David Hume, who argued that beauty is subjective, but that one can develop their taste to better find beauty, without going into how one does that. Hume also argued that people can become experts and experts can reach a consensus, effectively acting like an objective standard - *Hamlet* is good because a lot of people over the decades have deemed it good. He contrasted this with Kant, who argued that taste is subjective, which must be true, because Kant said it. He laid out three descriptors of value - agreeable, beautiful, and good. *Agreeable* describes something that is not good but fulfills its purpose, like bad food for a starving person. *Good* describes something that meets our desires, so a hammer is objectively good at hammering nails. *Beautiful* descibes something that is not needed, like a flower's looks, and therefore can be judged in an unbiased manner. While a color could be agreeable to some and disagreeable to others, something beautiful gives people the sense that everyone should hold a similar opinion to them. Just Write elaborated that nature may contain things that people agree are beautiful, but art is different since the purpose of art is up for debate. Theo already took issue with Just Write's summary of Kant, since Kant was not a literary critic and his critique of art was only a tertiary topic to his much broader views on metaphysics, additionally disagreeing with Kant's claim that someone could judge beauty from a position of disinterest, and countered that what he's seen EFAP try to do is categorize what parts of art that they can under "good" rather than "beautiful," judging how well a story functions the same way one would judge how well a hammer hammers nails.

Going off of that topic, Theo argued that there is not much value in saying a painting's purpose is to be a painting or a story's purpose is to be a story, since that doesn't reveal much more than a definition. MauLer responded that the other value of art's purpose being to get an emotional response doesn't give anything to be measured since someone may simply not respond emotionally, and the only standard that could be measured without being subjective is an intrinsic property - an art piece must do a thing to be the thing that it is. For example, a story must show a progression of events or it is not a story, or writing must be readable in order to be writing - those things are not projected onto it, that is what they are. A carpenter wouldn't argue that a joint is subjectively a dovetail joint, even if the term was created by humans you could still apply the term objectively. Theo replied that he'd not heard it put that way before and would have to get back to him on it, and MauLer concurred that it is an ongoing topic, with Theo adding that the debate has existed for some time and each faction gains more nuance to their claim.

Naturally, Just Write related this to *The Last* *Jedi*, and seemingly summoned by an attempt to defend the film, Wolf returned to the call, just in time to hear Just Write defend the design of the bombers in place of the superior Y-wings on the grounds that "most people don't know what a Y-wing is" and shout at him for saying something so dense. Just Write argued that noticing the lack of Y-wings would require you to have a certain level of knowledge, to which Theo asked why it is a bad thing for critique of a piece of media to require knowledge of the media. Just Write argued that the worse bombers were used to communicate the idea that the ships are slow, justifying why they were easily destroyed, as if there was no other way that the bombers could have been destroyed easily, and that the lack of Y-wings would only be considered an issue by someone who values continuity over the impact of that scene, which the roster argued was not a dichotomous thing. To top it off, Just Write accompanied his claim that Y-wings were obscure with footage of Y-wings from *Rogue One*, which had come out a year prior. He went on to explaine that *Star Wars* originally ended with them destroying the Death Star with ease, lacking the climactic dogfight, and argued that there was no objectively better ending because the original one lacked tension while the chosen ending had its own issues, claiming that Leia should not have gone back to the Rebel Base since she knew they were being tracked, and the Empire should have destroyed the planet they were orbiting and let them go off orbit rather than wait for the moon to enter range. MauLer countered that Leia deemed the risk worth taking to get the plans to the Rebels, and allowing Yavin IV to go off orbit wouldn't kill the Rebels.

He put forth that plot holes aren't the real reason why people usually dislike a movie, and the roster thanked him for letting them know what people feel. He argued there are deeper reasons why people don't enjoy a movie, recommending people watch Jack Saint's video on the subject to find out more, causing Wolf to burst into a fit of laughter. He then recommended Patrick Willems' "SHUT UP ABOUT PLOT HOLES" video where he famously told people they were watching movies wrong, and an article on the shortcomings of thinking logically. He then went into his own view on why there are better ways to analyze film, which he openly admitted was just his subjective opinion. He brought up *The Dark Knight*, listing off a volley of plot holes with no regard for their impact on the story CinemaSins-style, arguing that Joker would require extensive planning which contradicts him claiming he has no plan, ignoring that Joker is a liar who intentionally obscures his background as evidenced by him telling contradictory backstories and having untraceable custom-made clothing. He jabbed that money doesn't burn as fast as it did, ignoring that it was doused in gasoline, and asked what happened at the party Joker crashed after Batman left, which was not a plot hole and simply an unanswered question, and it could be inferred that since he was there for Harvey Dent he would have left upon not finding him. MauLer pointed out that any plot holes he did correctly describe would if anything bolster their point, since that would show a movie could have issues objectively but still be liked subjectively. Just Write concluded that the reason people did not notice these plot holes was because the movie had good pacing, because. He assured everyone that he was not saying logic doesn't matter, since it often does (when?), and *every* decision made in filmmaking matters. He immediately followed this up by saying focusing on plot holes will create hollow pieces of art, and the purpose of his channel is to teach (objectively?) good writing, which should focus on content and not form. MauLer asked what is form if not created by the content, and tangented on the broader topic of plot vs theme, arguing that if your goal is to simply send a message, then just write a poem or an essay, but if your goal is to tell that lesson *through* a story, then the story has to function as well as the theme.

Just Write referenced yet another philosopher, Alexander Pope, with a quote from him asserting that bad criticism does more damage than bad writing (objectively?), arguing that bad criticism influences more art to be bad, and therefore criticism too focused on logic will make movies too focused on logic, raising the question of how a film can be *too* focused on anything if art's purpose is subjective. He claimed this came at the expense of story, character, and theme, even though once again it is not dichotomous. He expressed that he wouldn't want someone to decide there is no point in writing their story because it doesn't make perfect logical sense, raising the question of why not just improve the story rather than simply give up entirely. He gave the example of not wanting to live in a world where the Wachowskis never made *The Matrix* because it didn't match the laws of thermodynamics, to which the roster responded that a science fiction film having fictional science isn't illogical, adding that no one is asking for perfection anyway, and almost all films have flaws but writers can strive to make them less flawed. Just Write concluded that art criticism can do so much more than just deem something good or bad, to which MauLer countered that the argument given for *why* the movie is good or bad would be where that substance is found. Just Write stated his goal to explore this, which was why this video was the first episode in a series called History of Arguments (of which no more episodes were made). Theo was insulted that he would claim knowledge on the topic after how he butchered Hume's and Kant's ideas

### **on Tangibility**

During EFAP 69 (Part 2), MauLer showed the gang a clip from Just Write's video on *The Rise of Skywalker*, where Just Write said that the movie wasted time on new, needless characters that could have been spent developing the relationship between Finn and Poe. Just Write argued that developing a relationship between the two of them would not just appeal to people who wanted to see them in a relationship, but would have made the movie a "tangibly better" movie. With this statement, Just Write made a clear distinction between something that somebody simply likes because it did something they personally want, and the actual quality of that thing on its own merits, though he avoided using the words "subjective" and "objective" to describe them

## **Browntable**

In EFAP 48, Browntable, who likes certain art, sought out to answer the question of why people even bother learning how to make art in school if art is subjective. In the process he made one of the most important discoveries in the realm of art critique - Good Rat

## **Frame By Frame**

In EFAP 50, Frame By Frame made the case that Rey's characterization in the sequels makes sense, then followed that up by claiming that it does not actually have to make sense, and that nobody should care because it is a movie about space wizards for children and none of it makes sense. He concluded that the complaints people had about Rey are dumb, but you're not dumb if you have complaints, because all film is subjective, but he won't accept "unjustifiably putting a false claim on a film," implying you can indeed be objectively wrong about a film

## **Fatmanfalling**

On Twitter, YouTuber Fatmanfalling likened MauLer's content to CinemaSins', oddly enough holding up CinemaSins in high regard in order to paint MauLer as being the worse of the two. He found it hypocritical of MauLer to criticize other reviewers for saying everything they say is just their opinion, because MauLer himself has agreed it is possible for him to be wrong. A year later, EFAP 51 covered a stream of Fatman's where he talked to a fan of both MauLer and himself named CelticPhoenix. Fatman summed up all of MauLer's work as "I would have preferred a different movie" and questioned how MauLer could spend an entire hour denouncing the concept of subjectivity, a claim MauLer found strange both since he found it pretty much impossible not to be both objective and subjective in different parts of what you do and since surely a topic as broad as how you view existence could be talked about for well over an hour. When Phoenix pitched to him the example of someone checking the temperature on a broken thermometer, thus having an objective opinion since it is not a fact but also not influenced by emotion, Fatman laughed in exasperation at him not simply calling that a "guess," with MauLer finding it odd to describe someone as "guessing" the temperature when they literally just read it off a thermometer.

He denied there was any debate to even be had since anyone who believes there are objective standards of quality is just incorrect, trying his own hand at what he thinks it is to be objective by saying a movie is good because one of the shots is in focus. Phoenix tried to explain that while one can judge the competence of the camerawork in a shot that it is supplementary to more important things about a movie, leading Fatman to ask what MauLer would even consider supplementary to mean, something he might know if he actually watched his videos. Despite having previously said MauLer is definitively wrong, he now declined to debate MauLer since MauLer would set the terms of what it means to be right. He recounted Patrick Willems describing *The Last Jedi* as "a movie about space wizards intended for children" and erroneously described MauLer's response as just calling that subjective. Fatman defended Patrick from the thing MauLer never said by explaining that Patrick's viewpoint is just as valid as everyone else', apparently forgetting that Patrick had used that point to invalidate other people's viewpoints

## **Freudian and Bigideas**

In a debate on whether traps are gay that took place in 121 AD but was only uncovered on EFAP 54, learned scholar Freudian imparted the following wisdom onto his pupil Bigideas - "The world of our senses is surely subjective, never doubt that, fair Bigideas. But within the framework of what our eyes and peens do tell us, your summertime fling had a manhood beneath her stola. You ought to confess to your wife, o pupil"

## **Martin Scorsese**

Martin Scorsese infamously claimed that Marvel movies were not cinema, bringing on a storm of people both agreeing and disagreeing with him. MauLer, Rags, and Fringy took the stance that Marvel movies *were* cinema, they just sucked, and found it odd that there some people who were staunchly opposed to the idea that a story could be objectively good or bad were on board with the idea that a movie could flat-out be not cinema

## **Curio**

In EFAP 73, Curio tried to answer the question of whether or not art could be judged objectively. He used, of all things, CinemaSins as his case study, despite CinemaSins openly claiming that their reviews are not meant to be taken seriously and they get things wrong on purpose for the sake of a joke. He used CinemaSins expressing disbelief that Black Widow would be a useful member of the Avengers due to her lack of strength as evidence that people who believe stories can be judged objectively believe it is impossible for a woman to win a fight because they are "objectively" weaker than men, despite CinemaSins never using the word objective. He noted that movies that get deemed objectively bad, like *Black Panther* and *Captain Marvel*, all have women or non-white characters as protagonists, apparently forgetting the amount of flak movies like *Thor The Dark World* and *Iron Man 3* got upon release, and contrasted the Black Widow example against people's willingness to believe Superman can fly without an explanation, apparently forgetting Superman is an alien from a fictional race with different physiology than humans. He concluded with disappointment that people can more easily believe a man can fly than that a woman can fight, apparently forgetting that characters like Supergirl can also fly.

To exactly no one's surprise, Quinton Reviews commented praising this video, finding the ending line poignant

## **Wisecrack**

In EFAP 76, Wisecrack took the stance that we the audience were, in fact, watching *Star Wars* wrong, as they should have been thinking of it like an Arthurian legend, where nothing has to add up as long as the iconography is the same

## **CinemaWins**

In EFAP 83, CinemaWins' otherwise fairly decent video on *Joker* ended on an odd note, with him claiming that every movie would actually be bad if looked at "objectively"

## **HelloGreedo**

In response to people criticizing the hyperspace kamikaze from *The Last Jedi* for not making any sense, HelloGreedo told them that that did not matter, and simply asked them "how did it make you... *feel*?" in EFAP 78. This naturally raised the question of what he would make of someone telling him they felt like it made no sense

## **Cosmonaut Variety Hour**

The Cosmonaut Variety Hour once held that there was a difference between a movie being objectively good or bad and someone liking or disliking it, but later evolved as a critic, and no longer believes that. Despite this, he later claimed on Twitter that the audience score for a movie is worthless and only the critics' score mattered, raising the question of how some people's opinions could be more valid than others if all art criticism is subjective, though he was soon convinced that audience ratings have their place as well.

In EFAP 85, the gang took a look at some snippets of Star Wars reviews he had done to get an idea of how he judges these things, and saw him claim that anyone who considers the prequels better than The Force Awakens is dumb, and only people trying to be edgy would say it is a bad movie, which could not be true since it made a lot of money. He also described film criticism as falling into three categories - valid/correct, invalid/incorrect, and "yeah... you're right... but like... it's not that big of a deal... get over it," seemingly drawing the distinction between that which was objectively right, that which was objectively wrong, and that which was objectively right but should not be cared about subjectively. He later brushed off any criticisms of something in the Star Wars sequels being dumb on the grounds that everything in *Star Wars* is dumb, and we simply find reasons to like it anyway, once again seemingly drawing a distinction between the objective and subjective. He argued that anyone who likes the *Star Wars* prequels only does so because they were brainwashed by the merchandising, apparently having forgotten that he had already called every *Star Wars* movie equally dumb and claimed people found reasons to like them, and purported to have respect for people who hated the prequels and sequels equally, but not people who only hated the latter.

In EFAP 98, Cosmo similarly tried to argue that anyone who thought *The Last of Us Part II* was bad was stupid, and shouted in disbelief at the idea that Joel was a beloved character, despite whether or not someone loves a character being the most subjective thing there is. Later in EFAP 122, he rated Season 1 of *The Mandalorian* a 10/10, explaining that while it was not perfect, it was exactly what he wanted out of Star Wars, once again raising the question of what "not perfect" could be referring to outside of his own subjective judgment.

On Twitter, Cosmo attempted to argue against the idea that movies could be objectively good or bad by recounting how he and his friends found *Tall Girl* laughably bad, but could not actually find much wrong with it, seemingly not realizing that this example actually supported the idea that an objective and subjective assessment of something are two different things. When a fan of his informed him that according to MauLer's "objective" assessment, *Avatar The Last Airbender* was mid, Cosmo was flabbergasted, raising the question of why calling *Avatar* mid was any more objectionable than calling anything else mid when nothing is actually objectively better or worse than anything else. Cosmo eventually declared victory on Twitter when he got MauLer to admit that the reason why he argues with people is because he believes himself to be right, implying that Cosmo only argues with people not because he thinks they are wrong but just because he wants to annoy them. In an unrelated Tweet, a fan of his asked him his thoughts on *Metal Gear Solid*, and he replied that it was bad but he liked it, even though if everything is subjective there would be no difference between liking something and considering it good, or disliking something and considering it bad.

When confronted with the idea that his standards are wildly inconsistent, Cosmo explained that he had evolved as a critic in between the examples provided, not realizing that two of the examples came from the same video

## **Blue Bantha Milk Co**

In EFAP 101, Blue Bantha Milk Co laid out that there are two things that get under his skin, the first being when people say a movie is "objectively bad," something that can't be possible since all art is by definition subjective, while the word objective means facts. He went on to say that the only things that can be stated as fact are things like *The Last Jedi*'s 91% critic score on RottenTomatoes, to which MauLer brought up that RottenTomatoes counts a 60 or above as Fresh, and that the audience score (which Metal brought up is based on over 200,000 reviews vs the critics' 450) was a 44, the lowest audience score for a *Star Wars* film. Blue Bantha Milk also cited the box office earnings as a metric for success, prompting MauLer to just repeat the word "*Transformers*" in response. Anna brought up the clip of none other than Mark Hamill saying that a film making a lot of money isn't the same thing as it being good and Rags brought up that it made 700 million less than *The Force Awakens*, which would presumably be the benchmark. Bantha Milk concluded that though you cannot judge art objectively, if you could, *The Last Jedi* would be objectively good, but then invalidated his own point by saying that that is not actually how you judge movies, because even the worst movies ever made like *Manos: The Hands of Fate*, *Troll 2*, and *The Room*, which he had somehow managed to deem the worst movies ever made despite believing all film is subjective, have a following, and you can't say something is objectively bad because there is nothing that is disliked by everyone. The second complaint that Blue Bantha Milk couldn not stand was that *The Last Jedi* is full of bad writing and is broken to the core, because bad writing is also subjective. He read out a passage from a cringe poem and deemed it bad, once again raising the question of how he knows it is bad if everything is subjective, but informed the viewer that it still made lots of money, despite having said earlier that money made is not how you judge art. Metal shouted that that was literally the same complaint said a second time.

Bantha Milk then completely invalidated his previous points by saying there is such a thing as "objectively bad writing," as there are rules which can be bent and broken. He cited Tim Burton's *Planet of the Apes*, where Mark Wahlberg told an ape he would show him something that will change his whole worldview, when Mark Wahlberg's character doesn't actually learn that thing until the end of the movie. Anna had seen the film, and corrected that while Wahlberg's character didn't know the truth that is revealed at the end of the film, what he thought was true (that he was visiting from an alien planet) would still be mind-blowing to the apes, and Rags pointed out that even if he had no idea what the truth was going to be, he could still believe that whatever it is would be shocking. MauLer pointed out that even if his example was wrong he at least was on the same page as them (despite believing that he wasn't) that a blatant contradiction would be objectively bad writing. Bantha Milk also elaborated that a film can be broken in an "entertainment way," which MauLer and Rags pointed out was as subjective as it can get. He cited the Bond movie *A View to a Kill*, which he claimed was not entertaining because we are told the villain's plan before Bond, and have to spend the whole movie waiting until he catches up, meaning it doesn't work as a "well-written piece of fiction." Anna countered that that's the case for *Silence of the Lambs*, one of her favorite movies, and Metal added that that's the premise of every episode of *Columbo*.

Bantha Milk then proclaimed that Holdo not telling Poe the plan is not bad writing, and is in fact incredibly good writing, because good writing (contrasted against what he previously called "objectively bad writing") should trigger an emotional response from the viewer (which is literally the definition of subjective, with MauLer simply asking what if it didn't provoke that emotion in him), and stays with people afterwards and produces discussion - naturally, Rags related this argument to the Holocaust. Bantha Milk laid out why he thought Poe's plot in *The Last Jedi* was good, concluding that its message tied in with Luke's story, and was even stated out loud by Yoda, giving the movie a throughline, which *is* a sign of "good fucking writing" (objectively?).

Blue Bantha Milk Co concluded the real gripe people have with the film is not it being "objectively bad" or "bad writing" (which he put in air quotes even though he conceded that those are real things), it's that they can't handle a male character being talked down to by a female character (even though he had said earlier we would have trusted Leia) or an Asian American woman being a total badass, to which Anna jabbed that said Asian woman sexually harasses a black man. MauLer expressed nostalgia at this, since it had been a while since he had been told he was racist and sexist for thinking a *Star Wars* movie is bad, and it was nice to get back to basics. Bantha Milk left off by saying he is sick of trying to persuade idiots to like the movie (which is all subjective anyway)

## **ATAT Chat**

At the end of his parody review of *The Empire Strikes Back* seen in EFAP 106, ATAT Chat declared that if you disagree with his opinion, you are objectively wrong, apparently under the belief that this is something people like MauLer think

## **Jim Sterling**

On EFAP 150, the gang took a look at Jim Sterling's 100% objective review, which just listed basic facts about a video game, to send the message that that is the only thing that could truly be objective, and everything else is objective

Naturally, every other Jim Sterling video is filled to the brim with him calling other people wrong and informing them that the correct stance has been decided already long ago, and that they should just stop trying to argue their case

## **Synthetic Man**

Synthetic Man took the odd stance in EFAP 217 that MauLer's opinions on games are suspect because MauLer looks at things objectively, but video games are subjective. This was an already odd claim given that video games are literally computer programs, and any story they have could be judged the same way that a story in a movie is, and was made even odder by Synthetic Man calling enemies in the game "objectively poorly designed," and spending much of his time telling other people their opinions on *God of War Ragnarok* are outright wrong

## **Organized Chaos**

EFAP 218 saw Organized Chaos try to skim through MauLer's long review of *Multiverse of Madness*, repeatedly finding himself begrudgingly agreeing that something MauLer had said was correct and grunting in frustration that MauLer cared about something he considered insignificant. Organized Chaos asked if MauLer's infamous "objective review" was really just a bunch of nitpicks, to which MauLer figured that if by nitpick he means that it is technically accurate, but not something that he cares that much about, then if anything that would indeed be objective.

## **Salacious Crumb**

Rags' roommate Salacious Crumb's laughter is triggered, possibly involuntarily, by other people's suffering, as Rags recounted in EFAP 219. This has proven to be somewhat clairvoyant, as seen when Crumb spent the duration of *The Force Awakens* cackling despite general audiences enjoying it, seemingly aware that the film's reputation would sour over the years. This makes Salacious Crumb's laughter a dependable metric for a film's quality, better than even the best of film critics

## **Hasan Piker**

MauLer joined the 285th episode of The Sitch & Adam Show, where they took a look at Hasan Piker telling Drinker and anyone else who had a strong emotional response to the *Barbie* movie that they should commit suicide. Hasan deemed *Barbie* "objectively a success" on the grounds that it grossed a billion dollars, instructing Drinker to cede judgment to the filmmakers who clearly know what they're doing, apparently unaware of the fact that Drinker himself is a published author and also apparently forgetting that he is an anti-capitalist who should not be using profit as a measure of quality. Hasan repeatedly referred to *Barbie* as not simply a movie for children, but for children *and* adults, as a reason why it should not be taken seriously, Despite this, he had criticisms of the movie of his own, believing it was unambitious in showing the darker side of the Barbie society and that the film's climax lacked historical materialism and sent a liberal incel message

## The Jigsaw Killer (John Kramer)

It may be assumed that John Kramer, better known as Jigsaw, believes morality to be objective, given his *modus operandi* of forcing those he considers to have lived their lives incorrectly to engage in dangerous and potentially lethal games in order to improve their worldview. However, Jigsaw made it known that he considers this all to be just his opinion in *SAW V*, where he took the bold stance that "KILLING IS DISTASTEFUL... to me."

His opinions on movies are unknown

## **YourMovieSucks**

On EFAP 248, when asked by MauLer what he considered to be art and not art, YourMovieSucks gave a more nuanced answer than many other have, saying, "If we're talking about like, definitions, or the philosophical definition that I would have, I would say everything's art, I would say life's fuckin art, right. So when I say that something's like, more or less art, it's in the same vein as saying there's no true objectivity but something can be more or less objective. You can have someone in the jury for a crime and it's like, 'okay they know the victim,' that's less objective than someone who doesn't know the victim sitting on the jury, although no one is truly objective, so there's varying degrees of scale without being absolutist about it. I think that anything and everything can be considered art but I would argue that the more artful pieces of media that exist are the ones that are not showing us things that have already been shown before"

## Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand coined the term "objectivism" to refer to her own political philosophy. It has nothing to do with movies, but people get the names confused sometimes

### Hasan Piker

Hasan Piker positively compared himself to Andrew Ryan, an antagonist in *Bioshock* partly based off of Ayn Rand, citing the quote "Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?" as being inherently socialist

## **ethanisonline**

On EFAP 251, ethanisonline proudly declared that the infamous banana duct taped to the museum wall was art, and that the guy who ate it was "even more art. Later on, however, he would scoff at the idea that Thomas Kinkaid's paintings were art, on the grounds that they were uninspired. Ethan also considered anyone who did not like the art that he liked to be afraid of the art, rather than just disliking it