On the Jumping of Sharks--What LG15 is Doing Wrong

AGuyNamedJoe · Post by **AGuyNamedJoe** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 5:35 pm

DreamerM, I guess I need to spell this all out. Your face will turn red I'm sure.

Bree - no parents.
Daniel - no parents.
Jonas - no parents.
Gemma - no parents.
Jonas' house is the symbol representing teenage utopia.
The Order is the symbol for adult oppression.

Bree lives alone in a big house with the cutest boy there is. He has everything and they can do anything they want, including eat ice cream for dinner. Jonas wants her. Daniel is in love with Bree and also wants her. The Order wants her. Bree is helpless and needs to be saved. Both Daniel and Jonas want desparately to save her.

It is all about playing out the fantasy in the forums. My friend, what we have here is porno for little girls, nothing more.

iamcool · Post by **iamcool** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 5:37 pm

daniel, bree and gemma all have parents

agent_fondue · Post by **agent_fondue** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 5:41 pm

iamcool wrote:daniel, bree and gemma all have parents

indeed they all do but Gemma lives with flatmates, Bree's parents have been notoriously kidnapped (adultnapped, parentnapped) and Daniel's parents just don't care (poor Daniel).

But, I am with you Josh, they do all own a set.

DreamerM · Post by **DreamerM** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 6:31 pm

AGuyNamedJoe wrote: It is all about playing out the fantasy in the forums. My friend, what we have here is porno for little girls, nothing more.

Nah, if it was porno for little girls Bree would be an effeminate, waifish young boy and Jonas would own an array of "toys," and be fond of flower arranging and music. And they'd both make lots of soft-spoken sappy speaches to eachother before they did it to the twill of violins.

......Anime fandom can be a scary place.

What we have here is a uniquely immediate form of storytelling being squandered on a once gripping but slipping plotline, nothing more.

SharpI · Post by **SharpI** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 6:58 pm

DreamerM wrote:The ARG arguement again.

Actually, no. aguynamedjoe talks about a "reality roleplaying game," which is different from an ARG, I think. The RRG is people trying to guess the plot developments and suss out the characters, a freeform pastime that arose organically out of the show very early on. The ARG is a puzzle set deliberately constructed to be presented to people and was developed later on.

I find AGNJ's idea very intriguing: that the show deliberately underinforms us just to fan the flames of fan interaction. Explains why story continuity so often seems to take a back seat to the video du jour, and why so many plot threads are left to dangle.

DreamerM · Post by **DreamerM** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 8:04 pm

SharpI wrote: that the show deliberately underinforms us just to fan the flames of fan interaction.

Have you BEEN to any other forums on the internet? On the Televisionwithoutpity.com messageboard for the show "House," page-long-fan-rants are the norm, doing exactly what you say: sussing out character and trying to figure out where the plot is going. Would you call that a RRG?

This is not interaction. It is FANS interacting with other FANS. It is a side-effect of creating a product people want to talk about. It is not and never should be the GOAL of any production.

EliCash · Post by **EliCash** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 8:13 pm

Dreamer, I have a question for you. It isn't a sarcastic question. It isn't a "gotcha" question. It's a sincere question.

What, specifically, do you think SHOULD happen next in this series?

(Note: Please feel free to take some time to think about it, before answering.)

DreamerM · Post by **DreamerM** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 9:02 pm

I'm sorry Eli. I fell into the trap, late in my very first post on this thread, of falling into the role of writer. It's a cap I wear too easily, and for me and for everyone else, I won't do it. If I started spinning plot threads of my own, I'd come to love my own ideas to the point that, when this show (obviously) does not use them I would be bitter and disappointed. Which would mean I was a hopeless self-centered narcisisit elitist, because of course, since I don't work for them, they have no reason to use my ideas, in fact for legal reasons they probably CAN'T, no matter weither my ideas are good or not.

My perfect job, the job I bitterly want, is to work as a writer on a show like this. That'd be nirvana. I wouldn't even care about the money. I'd LOVE taking up those dangling threads and seeing what I can do with them, to start making connections and going deeper.

It's the sort of stuff I live for. Not exaggerating.

Hear that, Miles?....yeah, this pathetic person wants to work for you. How sad is that? This sorry college person with no connections and no experience has the ego to aspire to a job as a writer. I don't even have any idea how to actually go about getting a job like that.

Hey, we can all have our dreams, right? Especially me. I'm Dreamer, after all.

Problem with dreams though is that they are fantasies. If I started getting spicific, Eli, I'd start dreaming I actually DID work for them. And waking up would hurt too much.

So that's just some personal spiel on my part. Sorry Eli.

It's not a cop-out, I swear.

Which makes it sound like more of a cop out.

Oh well.

I'm gonna go stare wistfully at the sky now and think about all the life I want as opposed to the life I actually have. Think about how little I have actually accomplished and how much more I wish I could give.

I'm the Dreamer. That will probably always be....all there is to me.

EliCash · Post by **EliCash** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 9:34 pm

Thanks for sharing. Although you didn't say very much, I feel like I understand you at least a little better.

Lurker · Post by **Lurker** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 9:56 pm

I don't want to resurrect that debate over whether this thing is interactive or not, and I'm not trying to be a dick, I promise, but something interesting -- which I absolutely must share -- has just been brought to my attention. On December 3, Yousef and Jessica appeared at VH1's Big in '06 award show (with lonelygirl15 incidentally winning "Web Hit"). Please note the condition of Yousef's hair in that picture.

Now, please note the condition of Yousef's hair in the latest video, "Back Home." Note also that in that very video, Daniel mentions getting a haircut. Keeping in mind the identical condition of Daniel's hair on December 3, compare it to his hair in the "The Test" and "Your Decision" vidoes. Remember now when the "The Test" video came along: December 7.

I'm not going to be the one to say it. I'm trying not to jump to any conclusions, I really am. There might have been two videos recorded just in case things went differently. I'd like to know, though, if that's the case, and -- if there is an alternate video -- I think it would be cool if we could see it. Please?

Slainte · Post by **Slainte** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 10:16 pm

DreamerM wrote:I'm sorry Eli. I fell into the trap, late in my very first post on this thread, of falling into the role of writer. It's a cap I wear too easily, and for me and for everyone else, I won't do it.

My perfect job, the job I bitterly want, is to work as a writer on a show like this. That'd be nirvana. I wouldn't even care about the money.
It's the sort of stuff I live for. Not exaggerating.

Hear that, Miles?....yeah, this pathetic person wants to work for you.
Hey, we can all have our dreams, right? Especially me. I'm Dreamer...

Problem with dreams though is that they are fantasies. And waking up would hurt too much.

Sorry Eli. It's not a cop-out, I swear.

Which makes it sound like more of a cop out. Oh well.

I'm gonna go stare wistfully at the sky now and think about all the life I want as opposed to the life I actually have. Think about how little I have actually accomplished and how much more I wish I could give.

I'm the Dreamer. That will probably always be....all there is to me.

" I am the Dreamer" can't you see? The world was not made for me"

Oh My God what a f'ing load!!!!!!!

This probably isn't going to be very popular but here goes...

Who the "F" do you self-styled critics think you are?

How many college degrees out there?
Ok how many grad degrees?

OK how many have written a successful screenplay? Hmm...ok... A published critique...published critique in a college paper? high school?

At first I was a little perturbed with the "Afternoon Special" audience I saw here. But hey, they are the ones having fun, asking questions, being curious, and buying in to the whole alternate realty thing.

For god's sake boys and grls this isn't Hamlet, it's not "Gone With the Wind" ...shit it aint even "Lost"...It is an entertaining little bauble made available for your amusement by a handful of people who are trying something new (at their own expense I might add)

DreamerM, I hate to say it but you have become - and very quiclky I might add - a perfect example of the pomposity assumed by most of the yahoo's on this and the other forum.

(Shaking my head) No I don't have anything productive to say. That's the whole f'ing point! Neither do you.

This thing is a game, a puzzle, a "what's next" serial. The anwer to life's questions will not be found within the confines of LG 15, her pimply faced companions and the bad "grown-ups" that are tryimg to use them.

Will Bree support Joan-us when he admits his homosexuality and that Daniel is what he wanted after all?
Will Gemma finnaly confess she is pregnant with Owens "love child"
And how will Bree get into a decent sorority after all this?

Stay tuned for a very special LG15

f'ing doofuses

and PS ..shut up I don't want to hear what you have to say.

Lurker · Post by **Lurker** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 10:36 pm

Slainte wrote:and PS ..shut up I don't want to hear what you have to say.

I realize you were addressing DreamerM, and I agree that at a few times he's gone overboard, but you do realize that anything enlightening you may have had to say in that post was just slapped aside with hypocrisy, right? If you don't want to hear what other people have to say, why they should pay attention to what you say?

Slainte wrote:Who the "F" do you self-styled critics think you are?

How many college degrees out there?
Ok how many grad degrees?

OK how many have written a successful screenplay? Hmm...ok... A published critique...published critique in a college paper? high school?

The same question can be turned around on you because of your decision to offer criticism of other people offering criticism on this subject.

Slainte wrote:For god's sake boys and grls this isn't Hamlet, it's not "Gone With the Wind" ...shit it aint even "Lost"...It is an entertaining little bauble made available for your amusement by a handful of people who are trying something new (at their own expense I might add)

You know that they're trying to make it big with this, right? This isn't just charity work. If anything, I'd think they'd appreciate feedback (and not just of the praise variety).

briska06 · Post by **briska06** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 11:14 pm

DreamerM wrote:
AGuyNamedJoe wrote: What we have here is a uniquely immediate form of storytelling being squandered on a once gripping but slipping plotline, nothing more.
Maybe you should be more proactive about it then, and make one yourself since you know all about these kinds of things, instead of whining about it idly on a forum.

DreamerM · Post by **DreamerM** » Tue Dec 12, 2006 12:39 am

Slainte wrote: For god's sake boys and grls this isn't Hamlet, it's not "Gone With the Wind" ...shit it aint even "Lost"...It is an entertaining little bauble made available for your amusement

I donno, "Hamlet," and "gone with the wind" were baubles in thier time: theatre was our television, comic books, and internet all in one. "Gone with the wind" was made to capitalize on the popularity of the book of the same name. Neither of them HAD to be art. They just kind of ended up that way by having complex characters and the kind of plots people don't get tired of arguing about.

If you have the chance to create something, then why not put everything you have into it? Why make "baubles for the masses" when you can make something reflective of what you see in people and the world?

Slainte wrote:shut up I don't want to hear what you have to say.

Then you don't have to read it. I don't pretend to speak for anyone except myself. Weither people agree with me or not is completely up to them. Here, and "the other board."
[/quote]

AGuyNamedJoe · Post by **AGuyNamedJoe** » Tue Dec 12, 2006 10:15 am

Hey man, we need to all lo... I mean, care about each other. We are just debating whether Lonelygirl15 was designed to be a story, not hate each others guts. DreamerM wants there to be a story and makes some excellent points supporting the "no story" theory, even though that was not his (or her?) intent. Can we analyse the last video (Back Home)?

Story: Daniel is at home. Daniel loves Bree.

The rest: The he had money, twinkie, comic book debacle. How could Daniel allow his one true love to eat from a dumpster when he had a pocket full of cash! But then, Daniel is the coolest guy there is for "riding the rails" (excuse me, I mean "catching out"). The "Bulls" are just there to spoil our fun but they are so stupid we can beat the system. New character Old Dude Walter introduced. Like, we will hear from him again. (By the way, if you plan to tour the country in an open boxcar for two months, the middle of winter is prime time.) Daniel got cleaned up. Okay, good to know. Daniel can do anything he wants because his parents are too dumb to catch on. How so cool. Daniel left Bree in danger! How could he do that! Daniel is moving on with his life but is so sorry he left. He misses Bree. Not fair to toy with our emotions like that. And the car. We can't forget Daniels ultimate sacrifice. And does Daniel know that everything he does in his bed will be caught on video? What will happen next? Everyone have a theory?

The point is that 90% of the videos are not about a story but give us lots to talk about, to speculate about, to dream about (hey, so I'm romantic), to ridicule even but most importantly, they give us the opportunity to just have some good clean fun. Lonelygirl15 is what it is so just enjoy it.

Also, could revenue be tied to website traffic? Maybe the more discussion, the more traffic, the more ad revenue.

P.S. Of course, I get the symbolism of the twinkies purchase but am lost as to the meaning behind the comic book. Perhaps someone can help me out here?