GWC "Would You Rather?" ... a thought experiment

GWC Community GWC Hive Mind
#1

Hello all,

I have been toying with an idea and wonder if I might prevail on GWC community for their take on it.

As the result of one or two ounces of too much holiday cheer this “would you rather” question arose.

For one entire year, would you rather

(1) give up all NEW forms of sci-fi (books, movies, games, pods etc.)

or

(2) give up all OLD forms of the sci-fi (ie. Rewatching, reread , reruns etc.)

Of course there was a LOT of sea-lawyering and back/forth over the details of the two cases. I went with giving up number one. Mrs. Oddball noted the choice would probably hinge on the age of the respondent. The younger the person the more they might lean towards answer two.

I’d be interested in hearing other folks take on this.

OB

#2

I would give up OLD stuff.
I LOVE rewatch and I’m big on the nostalgia factor but I would prefer experiencing new stuff then watch Star Wars again. The though part is not Watching Star Trek before Into Darkness but still.
After a year I could go back to it… right?

#3

Yes, after the year is over you could watch/read whatever you wished :slight_smile:

OB

#4

Easy. Give up the new stuff.

I am currently watching all of Star Trek in production order, TV and movies. I am also rewatching Fringe and Stargate, and Game of Thrones seasons 1 and 2. I also have the entire set of Song and Ice and Fire in paperback waiting to be read.

I am planning on watching Game of Thrones season 3, and Doctor Who season whateveritisnow. I’ll miss 'em for a few months, but compared to the above there is no contest at all.

Half the time, I don’t see the new stuff until a year has passed anyway. I just watched Conan and the new Sherlock Holmes this year, and have yet to watch Dark Knight Rises, Prometheus, John Carter, and the like. I have plenty from 2012 to keep me occupied in 2013.

#5

Give up New stuff. As 5th Horseman said, I’m often late to the game of new and there is so much old I haven’t experienced especially in the written form.

That being said, I’m asking for clarification. By New stuff, do you mean new productions or new-to-you? If new-to-you, that would make a difficult choice.

I’ve also found that re-watching with someone new to say Star Trek is also a new experience. With my recent addition of Star Trek TOS on Blu-ray, my wife has been re-watching with me. I had no idea how many she never saw before. Watching through her eyes and sharing her thoughts has been entertaining. In a way, that’s a way to cheat your question. Grab a newbie.

Missing out on a year of new productions is not a great loss. Missing out on everything that has gone before would be tough. Sure I’d miss Into Darkness but that would be the only thing I’d miss. Weight that against Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke, Wells, Verne, it’s a small price to pay.

#6

I would probably give up the new stuff.

Quite frankly the sci fi there’s been so few sci fi shows on TV that I think are really great. We live in an era when new space-based Sci fi doesn’t exist anymore.

I’m rewatching Star Trek TOS along with the Mission Log podcast.

I probably could give up both old and new sci fi for a year. Why? Because there’s so much great non-scifi on TV now…old and new.
I could watch one of 7 different HBO serieses after another and that would take me a year.

I’m a total sci fi geek. But I’m not only a sci fi geek.

#7

I would give up the new stuff, Because there is an infantesimal ammount of old stuff for me to experience. In addition, a year from now all of that new stuff will be concidered old stuff that I do not have to wait for.

Don’t Panic! - Douglas Adams

#8

I’m going to assume that you mean new-to-me and old-to-me in the sense that even if a show aired a while ago but I haven’t seen it, then it’s new. That being the case, I would definitely give up old stuff for a year. I’m actually consciously doing that right now, because I’m the type of person who likes to rewatch and reread things over and again because I know how it will influence my emotions and I know if it’s quality or not. I’ve been urged to get into some new stuff and it’s been going well (I also may just be really far behind on the awesome that is in my Netflix queue.) Hope that’s the right assumption and a decent answer!

(And yes, I would probably rewatch/reread the things I can’t live without after my year is up.)

#9

This nuance did arise with us as well. My brother-in-law dubbed it “the fan boy conundrum” since we settled on NEW as being release/printed/streamed within the calendar year (country of origin hehehe). This then led my wife to her age correlation hypothesis since with “time shifting” there is no pressing need the older a person is to consume media straight away.

The prospect of your definition of NEW as new-to-me definitely escalates the discomfort for that option considerably :slight_smile:

I think I’d still give up the NEW.

OB

“I just like my hay-stacks Bobby” – Thomas Crowne

//youtu.be/o98T66d-eGk

#10

I hear “Drive” with Ryan Gosling is good :slight_smile:

OB

#11

Very interesting take on the joy of re-watch/reread. I had a heated argument at a holiday mixer with an academic (of sorts) who upon listening to the definition of this practice dismissed it as “closing off of one’s mind”. My argument back was that people routinely watch Shakespeare, listen to opera, spool up Janie Jones … not for the New input … but for the emotion of the content. Heck, I routinely watch TOS episodes for the same reason. It’s my mind … I’ll feed it as I see fit :slight_smile:

//youtu.be/kyoW0tf6N-Q

OB