The Fish

Just checked his twitter feed. All a little UKIP isn't it?

Won the Golden Shoe y'know? (with the 4th lowest goals tally in that competition*) *Is it a competition? Is that the right term?

I reckon he did mean best they've had. That said, they seem to think that, because Cattermole works hard and is therefore valuable to a team that is, more often than not, fighting relegation, he's a good player. He's not. He's utterly shit. And their reliance on him is a contributory factor in them being a team that's, more often then not, fighting relegation. But for years, they've had really bad players replacing really bad players, yet somehow, miraculously, surviving. I think that's lowered the bar. I'm not sure that it's a delusion, just a misalignment of what makes a quality player and what doesn't. Genuinely had a discussion with someone who insisted Sessegnon was better than Ben Arfa. Now, I know there are Newcastle fans who criticise him for his application, but even they would admit he's a better footballer than Sessegnon. so maybe the Sunderland fans are deluded :lol;

One thing I've noticed after spending a bit of time on there. It kind of makes sense that they value Cattermole and the like so highly, they've been absolutely starved of quality for years. Defoe is class, but the rest of their squads for the past decade or so have been a who's who of cloggers and fading stars. How often have they had a player who would walk into our side? Even the relegation sides? How many of ours would walk into theirs?

you spanner.

It's like they've swapped ears.

Saw that on twitter and briefly thought Bedford fans had kicked off

He's doing it for nothing, just the opportunity to prove the knobheads on twitter that he's better at this than they are. Myself included.

Reports that it was a big firecracker thrown at the bus. or "THEM FUCKN MUZZYS AGIN" so, y'know, could be anything

He really is one though. Finds Mrs Brown's Boys hilarious but hates the tv license, doesn't see why he should have to pay for post-natal care when it could funding away from vital research into hair loss and erectile dysfunction. Hides it all behind this pleasant facade, but honestly, when he thinks nobody's paying that much attention he mutters Daily Mail headlines under his breath

Boss, we haven't scored like this in months and Willo can't remember where he lives any more. Fahkin' exactly Colo me ohld choyna! Them cahnts won't spect it! The teams he had available to him though; Harper, Krul, Debuchy, Janmaat, Simpson, Colo... Enrique... Tiote, Cabaye, Jonas, Nolan, Ba, Ben Arfa, Carroll, Cisse. Some weren't amazing, but Jesus Christ they're all Premier League standard and we should have done more with what we had. Imagine Benitez with that lot.

If you love them so much why don't you marry them?

Remember when Cabaye curled a free kick to the far post (shocker I know) and we scored, and in the post game interview Pardew couldn't fucking wait to tell the world the goal was down to him? I bring it up because I'm convinced that's the only time he's told Yohan Cabaye to do anything but "'Ave a good gayme moi sahn"

I know it was Wacky and I know it was typically Wacky, but I can't for the life of me remember the rest of that.

Because it's a superhero movie. The kids of 15 might not have been alive for Toby Maguire's Spider Man and might not even have watched Garfield's. They haven't had a Spider Man of their own and while the upcoming movie isn't going to be a classic origin movie it is yet another reboot. That's who the studios are hoping turn up to the cinemas. Teenagers who'll watch the movie, buy the toys, play the video games, wear the merchandise and spend a fortune of their parents money on in-game purchases. Have to say I'm glad both major stables are departing from the heavy hitters. There's no way Guardians of the Galaxy would have been made if Iron Man and subsequently the Avengers hadn't knocked it out the park. DC now have the confidence to give Suicide Squad their own movie and while it might have been a misstep, it hasn't stopped them reaching out of the comfort zone and they're apparently pushing properties like Shazam and Nightwing. In short, the studios preferred to reboot the icons, who they're convinced will get bums on seats no matter how bad the movie is, rather than risk millions on a maybe. Maybe because they've been burned by Daredevil, Elektra, Constantine et al? Batman and Robin btw... Apparently "Anthony Hopkins was the first choice for Mr. Freeze, while Hulk Hogan was Schumacher’s third choice, which makes Batman and Robin the only movie in the history of mankind in which Hulk Hogan and Anthony Hopkins were up for the same role."

See, I don't think you've a problem with origin movies, I think you've a problem with bad origin movies.

It is, but there is more to most of the comic book titles. Spider Man is puberty and drugs and whatnot, X-Men is racism and bigotry, Iron Man was about nasty evil communism during Cold War era, but now it's pretty much Atlas Shrugged with added tank missiles. Yeah, but I'm the side of the coin that basically thinks that if the point/opinion I have about a political situation was worthwhile, someone would have made it by now. I'm not as well read on actual real world events as I am on the goings on inside a comic book.

The second one had one cool CGI scene, but nothing else, Catwoman didn't even have that. Everything looked like it was built out of balsa wood and bounced cheques I also think because origin stories are generally popular, studios mistake interest in a fresh character for interest in any old origin story. So, instead of introducing Nova, they'd rather do another Spider Man reboot. "Hey they loved the first Spiderman movie, we'll just do that again!" As an aside, it looks like they're having some fun with Thor's character in the new film. The short marketing clips seem to be pivoting him towards a more comedic role. Makes sense as I don't see Black Panther providing many LOLs.

I think if Nolan had lurched into Dark Knight without first setting up that world, we'd have struggled to buy the concept. Superman is a famous story with a familiar mythology no doubt, but Man of Steel was definitely supposed to be a setup for Dawn of Justice. The idea was obviously to give Batman a reason to distrust and fear Superman. The guy obliterated a city centre, killing hundreds of thousands of people. If we went into DoJ without seeing that, would we buy Batman's antagonism? (Not saying the film succeeded in it's plan, but that was surely the plan). And without it being an Origin movie, even a poor one as it was, Man of Steel would have basically been one of the Transformers movies. To get the audience on board with the DCEU, the audience needed to be reintroduced to Superman's mythos and have that mythos translated into the vocabulary of the grittier world where Batfleck, Wonder Woman, the Flash and Aquaman can exist, rather than Brandon Routh's shiny world. It is Dunning-Kruger

I can't contribute to the politics threads so...

I think the first one pales in hindsight, but at the time it was outstanding. It hasn't aged brilliantly, but I remember being absolutely blown away by it when it first came out. There'd been a slew of Superhero movies that were absolutely terrible; Elektra, Catwoman, Blade Trinity, and it looked like they would only get worse. Batman Begins wasn't just a movie that bucked that trend, it also changed the rules. You didn't have to camp it up and make the bangs bigger and the outfits more ludicrous. You could go more grounded, grittier. I think without Batman Begins you can't have the world that the other two operate in. I also think without BB you wouldn't have had Iron Man and the birth of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Jesus, that went on for a while! The poor thing'll look like a strawberry on a bit of frayed string.

Aye, but Batman and Robin came out and killed the franchise. It took 8yrs, a visionary director and some absolute heavyweight actors to get back on track. The first Nolan movie absolutely had to be the origin and not, as in Burton's Batman, a brief snapshot of the incident that sewed the seeds of the fully fledged Batman we see in the rest of the film. But Bruce Wayne the child (not) dealing with his loss, becoming powerful, returning with a focus and finally, at the films end, becoming Batman. Burton didn't tell the origin story, Nolan did. It was 20yrs between Reeves' Superman and Routh's and a further 7yrs until Man of Steel. 20yrs is definitely long enough to reboot a franchise like Superman and because of the failure and poor reception of Singer's Superman Returns it makes sense (to me anyway) to retell the story. Like Burton's Batman, Singer's Superman was already fully formed character and that film wasn't the origin story that could have established a contemporary version of Superman. Snyder should have nailed it, Nolan, Favreau, Johnston and Whedon and shown how you can do a variety of Superhero movies for the modern audience. But he done fucked it up. re: Bond he doesn't need an origin story movie because there's a Bond movie every 2 or 3 years and he's never had a pivotal incident that created him. Not like Uncle Ben biting the dust. Although Casino Royale was as close to an origin movie as Bond will likely get. Bond's character has a permanence in the broader culture that I'm not sure comic-book heroes do.