I'm not the only one, right?

I rented The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey yesterday, and got to relive all the excited feelings from back in December when I saw it in theaters. The viewing was a bit more haphazard, as I kept waiting for my parents and older brother to come in and watch with me. Plus I had to keep pausing or rewinding to earlier scenes to remind my mother that this movie isn't any of the earlier versions of the movie. Don't ask me why it was a surprise for her to see that all the dwarves look different.

At one point Ben and I were on the computer as neither of us remembered who the actor playing Bard the Bowman will be (who is also for some reason going to be in a couple reboots: Dracula, as well as The Crow), and besides getting lost clicking links and looking at awesome things on The Mary Sue, got into a discussion over watching certain franchise films despite confirmations that they suck. The topic that sparked this (not) new debate was the X-Men film series. I haven't watched any of them as they don't seem particularly well made from a story perspective, and then Ben stated he'd watched all of them despite knowing they weren't well made from a story perspective. The talk then devolved into how great the 90s animated series had been before remembering we were hungry and still needed to finish The Hobbit. The company hadn't even fought with the trolls yet!

Still, I started thinking back onto similar arguments we had on just such an approach to media. I am of the opinion that if something is bad, I will not throw more money at it than I have to. For example, The Chronicles of Narnia films became strangely awful starting with Prince Caspian. Thus, I felt no need to purchases DVD copies of either it, or its sequel, Voyage of the Dawntreader. Especially now when money is tight, and traveling is difficult, if I can acquire the means to view something for free, even if it's just a small preview of a project, I will do so (internet permitting). Then later, I will make efforts to support said project through monetary means if I actually like it. This view probably explains why I'm so into crowd-funding projects, especially Kickstarter.

Ben, on the other hand, will support something even if it is terrible. We have had many a debate just on Star Trek shows and movies, and why he would pour so much money into a franchise he's able to find so many flaws with. I still question why he would pay money to go see the re-released Star Wars films when he is so vocal about the editing changes, such as "Han shot first," not to mention the nefarious Jar Jar Binks.

So really I couldn't decide if this issue is a Ben thing or a male thing. I don't have much empirical evidence to support either conclusion, therefore I have no choice but to keep assuming my brother is full of crazy like the rest of the family (self included).