Photo by Fernando Medina/NBAE via Getty Images

Ugh, Shaq. By now, you’ve almost certainly read his latest stupid attempts to needle Dwight Howard, saying it would be a “travesty” if Howard left Orlando. Which is immediately ridiculous, because, you know … Shaq did that.

I’m not the first person commenting on this story, but this latest little whine has taken my Shaq hate to new levels. I’ve never enjoyed Shaq because I can’t stand his constant insecure posturing, his disingenuous media manipulation or his inability to coexist with anybody taking even a modicum of attention from him. But for some reason, I really think the casual fan is still fooled by Shaq’s act — I find it impossible to believe that anybody in 2012 thinks Shaq is actually an enormous jokester who just can’t help shooting straight, but it seems as if a lot of folks still think that. It’s baffling.

I find Shaq’s fascination with Dwight doubly frustrating because it’s just so obvious how threatened Shaq feels by Dwight, which is ridiculous. Look, I love Dwight, and he’s a more balanced player than Shaq ever was, not to mention an even more incredible athlete than young Shaq, but he’s clearly not currently as effective as Shaq was in his prime. Again, I am definitely NOT saying that Dwight isn’t an historically effective player, but good God, you guys remember what Shaq was capable of, right?

For him to spend his retirement trying to distance himself from every talent who also draws media attention is pathetic, and it makes me wonder what the appeal of Shaq’s persona is. Seriously — what about Shaq as an image or personality has grown his fan base? He doesn’t “just win;” he constantly ran his mouth and was frequently out of shape or clearly not trying. His biggest single advantage — being an enormous human — isn’t something you can seem to cultivate by scheduling post-loss shooting sessions in opponent’s gyms.

In fact, it seems like Shaq is at least as insecurely image conscious as LeBron, as periodically lazy as Rasheed Wallace and as preternaturally gifted as any one ever. Isn’t that the recipe for people seriously hating an athlete? Didn’t he play for like 13 teams in the last 3 years of his career? Isn’t he the single worst and least funny television analyst on an otherwise entertaining and insightful show? What is going on here?

I guess I’m willing to fall back on the standard explanation of the viewing public conflating decency as a human with the ability to win basketball games, but it seems like Shaq would’ve done more than enough to undermine that. I’m actually a little puzzled by this. Why don’t more people hate Shaq?

INTERMISSION

Bonus footage of Magic Shaq stomping on Tokyo, shaping whole worlds in the chaos of his wake.

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Photo by Kent Smith/NBAE via Getty Images

An NBA halftime show is rather predictable. Some joker from the stands will be marched to the three-point line while the public address announcer screams a few rules for the contest that is about to go down.

“A three-pointer is worth $1,000 and a free throw is worth $500!”

The people who didn’t rush to the concourse for halftime refreshments feign excitement even though it is a near lock that both shots attempts will fail miserably. No one is too upset though because the real excitement happens right after when a group of young men trot onto the floor, set up a trampoline, and delight the crowd with acrobatic dunks. No matter how many times you have seen this executed, it is still entertaining. At the conclusion of halftime, everyone has forgotten about the missed shots and talks about the ridiculous dunks.

Does this routine remind you of a certain NBA player?

I now refer to Blake Griffin as “The Halftime Show.” He is a miserable shooter and plays defense like a Washington General, but he consistently amazes NBA fans worldwide with his dunking ability. His dunks are so incredible that fans don’t even bother to mention his poor shooting or lack of defense. And why should they? Even though the league boasts superstars such as LeBron James, Kevin Durant, and Kobe Bryant, the second-year forward for the Clippers is one of the most exciting players in the NBA.

Griffin was recently voted into the All-Star Game as the starting power forward for the West. In my opinion, power forward in the Western Conference is the hardest spot among the ten starting positions to secure. No other position has the depth that power forward in the West can boast. Kevin Love, LaMarcus Aldridge, and Dirk Nowitzki will ride the pine for the Western Conference All-Star team, and Tim Duncan will watch from home even though his numbers per 36 minutes aren’t too far from his career averages.

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Photo by Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images

Well, that does it, y’all. I’m officially terrified to write anything about this year’s Magic team. Seriously. They win five straight games and I write about how hopeful I am? Time to lose four straight! If I despair over the losses and the obvious roster shortcomings? Let’s beat the best team in the league! At this point, I’m like Cool Hand Luke toward the end of the movie, sobbing at Dwight Howard’s feet and begging him to please not hit me again.

It’s impossible not to be made to look silly about this team. Keeping this in mind, I rewatched the Heat game from Wednesday night, to try and decide whether that win was representative of the season — volatile, highly variant, ultimately winning brand of basketball — or an outlier, the product of guys simply getting hot at the right times.

I gathered the high school debate team that I keep in my basement, posed them this question, and what follows is the transcript. The affirmative side is represented by a likeable multicultural team captained by an attractive and cheerful girl who has gained early entry to Wesleyan for cultural studies. The negative side is a bunch of sneering Aryan Draco types who will be finance majors at Brown.

OPENING STATEMENT: THE ORLANDO MAGIC ARE NOT BASICALLY CRAPPY; THEIR VICTORY OVER THE MIAMI HEAT WAS REPRESENTATIVE OF THEIR TEAM QUALITY

Affirmative opening statement: No less a poet than Nelson Mandela once observed that Twitter and a 24-hour news cycle have completely warped sports fans’ perspective and expectations. Whereas random variance and occasional losses once were processed semi-rationally (in every market outside of New York), the speed at which commentary moves now demands fans make opinions after every game — thus, every win guarantees a championship and every loss a failure.

The second quarter of the Miami game on Wednesday showed that, even with obvious roster shortcomings, the Magic have assembled enough talent to compete with anyone in the league. They scored their points on either excellent perimeter ball movement or as the product of outworking the other team in the post. They were able to absorb the impact of their recently porous defense, allowing Dwyane Wade 500,000 points on unmolested layups, and still win. Their greatest advantage, Dwight Howard, was both productive in himself and as a means of drawing attention from other players, resulting in excellent spacing and a metric ton of rebounds.

The above stated facts have led me to conclude that the Orlando Magic are not basically crappy, and that their victory over the Miami Heat was representative of their team quality.

Negative opening statement: I think it was Abraham Lincoln who said that even a broken clock is wrong twice a day.

We have long known the Magic can shoot well enough on any given night to beat a good team, but their method is simply not sustainable without more talent. Magic fans’ hopes rest on Ryan Anderson, who looks like a waterlogged Ben Affleck. Even if the team can occasionally catch lightning in a bottle, it’s foolish to have any long-term hopes for this team, because Dwight Howard is an enormous fickle infant, and unless the Magic reconciles itself to its essential crappiness, it will not rebuild enough to make up for the inevitable loss of Dwight Howard.

Affirmative rebuttal: People who refer to the Magic with singular possessives are intellectualy insecure twits. Ryan Anderson does not look like Ben Affleck.

Negative rebuttal: He does. He really does. If you made a moon bounce version of Ben Affleck or one of those sponge creations that children add water to to make enormous superhero-type deals, but if it was Ben Affleck. It should also be said that Otis Smith is still the general manager in Orlando, for whatever that’s worth.

Negative closing statement: Jason Richardson starts for the Orlando Magic. Chris Duhon plays for the Orlando Magic. There is no backup center, except for occasional minutes from Glen Davis. Anderson, the team’s second-best player, might actually be slower than most spry cater-waiters. It is obvious the Magic are sort of crappy.

Affirmative closing statement: We are forced to basically concede that the Magic, as presently constructed, are sort of crappy. We understand that Jason Richardson plays as if he literally does not have knees, but rather straight and frail rods for legs, like fluorescent tubes. We understand that Chris Duhon, during the start of the Magic’s run on Wednesday, literally dribbled into a crowd of three Heat players seemingly out of sheer will, before unaccountably hurling the ball straight into the backcourt. We are forced to confront that Hedo Turkoglu alternately looks like a genius or a lazy uncle who will not put down his Po Boy to hand you the remote.

However, they do still have enough talent which is used uniquely enough to win against anybody when they catch a ton of breaks. The Magic are a good team. Or, at least, to actually quote actual Ernest Hemingway: “Isn’t it pretty to think so?”

VERDICT: Those kids in the negative are SO POMPOUS! Affirmative wins, though it be added to the resolution that Ryan Anderson does look like a very meaty Ben Affleck.

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Photo by Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images

I like the idea of an underdog team beating all odds, standing in the face of the giant and winning an unprecedented victory. I like teams that share the ball, make the extra pass, aren’t concerned with stats — or anything — but the win. I also love the idea of a team with a few guys you haven’t heard of making a run in the playoffs. It’s why most of us, whether college basketball fans or not, will always watch March Madness. It’s sort of a place where anything could happen.

Now, as an NBA guy, part of me wants to carry over that “anything could happen” mentality to the next level. Part of me wants to know if Philadelphia is possibly for real.

But then reality sets in, and I’m wondering why it hasn’t set in for more people. Folks are going crazy for the Sixers right now, but what is the end game? Will they realistically go further than the second round of the playoffs? Are there those out there who think they will go to the Finals? Maybe I have no earnestness left in my bones, but when it comes down to it, I only care about who can win a championship. It’s why I have such a hard time even watching Magic games this year. It’s not because I hate them, it’s because I have to have the glimmer of hope that a team could make a serious run at a ring. Without that glimmer, it’s pretty hard to enjoy myself.

So when I hear the rabble-rousers stirring things up about how good Philly is, how deep their bench is, how they have the best 6-7-8 guys in the league, and how amazing that is, I tend to think, “Cool. They still probably can’t win a championship.”

Now, for those of you who might still be in “anything could happen” mode. It’s possible but unlikely. I defer to Tobias J. Moskowitz and L. Jon Wertheim, authors of Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports are Played and Games are Won, to show you what I mean.

A team with no starting all-star on the roster has virtually no chance — precisely, it’s 0.9 percent — of winning the NBA championship. More than 85 percent of NBA finals involve a superstar player and more than 90 percent of NBA titles belong to a team with a superstar. [...]

One first-team all-star on the roster yields a 7.1 percent chance of winning a championship and a 16 percent chance of making it to the finals. A team fortunate to have two first-team all-star players stands a 25 percent chance of winning a championship and a 37 percent chance of making the finals. On the rare occasion when a team was somehow able to attract three first-team all-stars, it won a championship 39 percent of the time and made the finals 77 percent of the time.

The authors aren’t talking about “general” All-Star considerations either. They are talking about first team All-Stars (the book interprets this as a starter), top five MVP picks, or top five salaries. Put differently, the authors aren’t allowing for just any of our favorite players to be labeled All-Stars. This is so you can’t sit back and say, “wait, Iguodola is an All-Star! He’s so good!” He wouldn’t make the cut according to this rubric since he can only be selected as a reserve and wouldn’t be considered a first team All-Star.

So what does all of this mean? Not a whole lot, to be honest. It’s interesting, though, to consider why we get so excited when a team starts playing really well. I for one always look at the end game. When a team starts to heat up, I wonder if they are really championship contenders. For that, we use stats and look to history. In the case of Chicago — they indeed have a first-team All-Star in Derrick Rose. Miami? They have two first-team All-Stars in LeBron and Wade (likely should have been three with Bosh). Hell, even Orlando would have a better chance of winning the championship if they could get into the playoffs.

So forgive me if I don’t jump up and down with you in praise of the Sixers. They are fun to watch, they are young, they are exciting, but their odds of winning a championship are extremely low. You might disagree, but I go by the numbers when I say that, especially when I’m dealing with a team that does not have a first-team All-Star.

Nate Drexler is a contributing writer for Magic Basketball. Follow him on Twitter.

Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images

I’m sure you guys care an awful lot, but after weeks of deliberation I have decided that I am in fact going to watch the Super Bowl. It’s not merely that two of my four least favorite teams are playing, it’s just that over the past year, I’ve lost most of my love for any football game in which the Packers don’t play.

The NFL has become such a bloated procession of hypocrites and idiots that I sort of feel forced to stop watching. If you’re going to just troll the bejeezus out of me with continuing excessive idiocy, at some point, I have to stop proving you right about how much viewers will tolerate garbage being stuffed down their throat, you know?

I’ve always hated the announcers, but John Gruden constant referring to every player with a preceding “this” (“This Jason Pierre-Paul is really special” or “If you’re coaching Joe Flacco, you have to tell him to explain that facial hair”) has taken my rage to new levels.

The video replays are maddening; there is no more intellectually stultifying way to spend three minutes than staring at a referee’s butt while former professional idiots on the other side of the split screen spend four minutes going over a touchdown catch like a crime scene.

I hate how the football media so relentlessly drums up faux masculine outrage — I know we’re all “warriors” or whatever, but not even a literal bantam rooster would be so insecure as to care what fat Rex Ryan said about them for the 374th straight week.

Finally, the league’s hypocrisy over player health has become too much for me. They care so much about player safety that they want to add regular season games! And it’s not that football is systemically violent as a product, it’s just that a few angry dudes break rules at a faster rate than we can fine them! I will stick to basketball, thank you very much, where we are blessedly free of racially driven policy controversies and commissioner fans accuse of rigging the outcome of league events.

So basically, I’m watching because the people in my life already think I’m enough of a tendentious prick. I heard on the radio today that not only will Kelly Clarkson be singing the national anthem, but that something called a Blake Shelton will be singing “America the Beautiful” and I thought to myself “Thank God I won’t be watching.” And then the face of everybody I’ve known since high school appeared in my vision and said “Dude, it’s the Super Bowl. You really are always like this, aren’t you?”

So I will watch and hope that everybody on the field but Hakeem Nicks is killed in a fan riot over a forty minute replay review.

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AP Photo/Mike Carlson

I don’t need to tell you this, but in case you haven’t been paying attention, the Magic pretty much stink right now. Naturally this raises questions. How do you fix it? What’s the root of the problem? Whose fault is it? Where do we go from here?

How about this question.

What on earth is Stan Van Gundy going to do for the rest of this season? If this roster stays the same, Orlando will drop below .500 and not make the playoffs. Note it. It’s really that bad.

Why do I say so? Well, for one thing, last night Orlando was more successful with Von Wafer and Larry Hughes on the floor than any combination of their first seven guys. It’s a disaster. No one can hit shots, and I’m talking about the open shots as well as the contested ones. You’ve got Glen Davis fading away from 15 feet, guys trying to give Dwight the ball seven feet from the basket, everyone and their mother turning the ball over like they have absolutely no clue how to make a strong pass, and Stan Van Gundy about ready to pull out his hair and roll around on the court like a mad man.

To make matters worse, you can see it all over these guys’ faces. Turkoglu is the best example. He looks like he’d be happier hanging out with his family somewhere, eating duck, wearing Italian suits, and laughing about how fun yesteryear was. He has no interest whatsoever in being on a basketball court. I’m going to dare to say it — his time is up. It’s come and gone. I love the guy to death, but no type of shock therapy can revive him from his current state.

Speaking of guys who are probably done, Jameer can’t dribble, and when he tries to dribble, he falls. He also can’t shoot for some reason, so guys don’t really have to guard him at all when he’s in a pick-and-roll. I don’t know why, but you can probably stick a fork in him too. Von Wafer did a better job bringing the ball up the floor against the 76ers than Nelson has this season. So did Larry Hughes.

Ryan Anderson does things well, but not as consistently as anyone wants. He plays decent games and then bad games. Also, he outrebounds Dwight sometimes, which is a crying shame. How is that even possible? Besides, we can’t honestly expect any more than we’re getting from Anderson. He’s a role player and has had a hell of a start, but the law of averages is starting to kick in.

Jason Richardson is nonexistent, and the same goes for Quentin Richardson, I could go on. For now, though, I’m done trolling on individuals. That was just a rant to set up my thesis. Here we go.

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It’s time to have a society intervention, friends. A sickness has blossomed into an epidemic, and unless we do something, it may become a permanent problem. I’m talking about “S**t Girls Say” and all of the spinoff videos that have forced me to unsubscribe to otherwise decent friends on Facebook. The first one, very funny. But it wasn’t funny because it was ludicrously overspecific, self-referential and had a narrow appeal. In fact, NOTHING IS FUNNY FOR THOSE REASONS. THEY ARE THE REASONS THINGS ARE UNFUNNY. The first video succeeded because that guy was such a talented comic actor.

After that? I chortled at “S**t Black Girls Say.” I grudgingly clicked on “S**t White Girls Say to Black Girls.” Now? S**t Bartenders Say? S**t People Say to People With Tattoos? I swear to God somebody asked me last weekend if I had seen “S**t Gay Guys Say to Their Cats.” Because I have not watched it, I assume gay guys talk to their cats the same way I do. I do not talk to my cat about being straight, I talk to him about whether he wants some kibble and why he has crapped all over the mat in front of his litter box. “Hey, Bojangles, I sure love women, and I sure don’t have quips about clothing products,” is a sentence I have never spoken.

Together, friends, we can end this, and we can go back to a world where really dumb Ryan Gosling tumblrs are the only stupid meme. He is very, very handsome, everybody, but Typography Ryan Gosling is not funny.

My cat’s name really is Bojangles, and he is obese. Gradually, Magic Basketball readers, I reveal little slivers of my life as we grow more comfortable with one another.

GAME OF THE WEEK

Celtics 91, Magic 83
Boy, it sure is a good thing I didn’t publicly write that I was willing to excuse Monday’s suckfest because the Magic seemed so resilient. It suuuure is a good thing I did not publicly state that I was starting to believe in the Magic’s fortitude and chemistry. It SURE. IS. A. GOOD. THING. That the Boston Celtics did not win without Rajon Rondo TWICE IN ONE WEEK. My trying to stay objective about the Magic is not because of ethics, it’s because I hate them and they are stupid every time I try and think otherwise.

INTERMISSION

A MOUSE SNORING. OH MY GAHHHHHH!!11

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AP Photo/Mike Carlson

After spending Thursday watching Jameer Nelson play, I regret to inform you that I have nothing groundbreaking to report. I don’t have answers, I don’t have a solution, and my prognosis is going to sound obnoxiously simple.

There are not two ways to cut this pie. Jameer shoots out of rhythm, misses layups, turns the ball over, passes with less mustard, and falls over a bunch (what is that all about?) His defense is lazy and uninspired, and his offense is passive and slow.

In a word, Jameer looks absolutely terrible right now, and there isn’t a ton of evidence that he is going to get any better.

Don’t start blowing your fan gaskets just yet. Let me explain. We love to revisit 2009 and use it as the basis of every argument about why the Magic are good, and how they are capable (with a lot of these same guys) of winning a championship.

More frequently than any other player on the current roster, guys love talking about how good Jameer was in 2009. He was aggressive, he scored a ton, he hit his long-twos, and we loved Jameerkat! What if 2009 was an anomaly for Nelson? Anyone ever think of that?

That was really his only standout season after all. In surrounding years he’s marginal at best (or injured).

What if this is the best we’re going to get from Jameer, the guy who once captured our hearts? What if the Dwight saga and the Otis Smith shenanigans were too much for Jameer? What if it weighs on him now and he’s just had enough? What if he’s sad about Dwight leaving? Maybe he doesn’t like the roster anymore. I really don’t know, but Jameer stinks, and the proof is in the pudding.

The point here is not to slam on Jameer. It’s to spur you on to consider the possibility that perhaps your standards (and mine) are too high for Jameer Nelson.

There was a point in the game against Boston where Jameer got to the hole on a nice drive. Less than 30 seconds later he got a great look from the top of the key and buried a triple. You could almost see it in his eye that he was ready to get back in the saddle and start beasting again.

So what did he do? Forced the issue on the ensuing two possessions, missed a layup, and took a terrible pull-up three that bricked miserably.

Look, we all have our bad days, but the problem for Jameer right now is that even when he starts to catch a little bit of fire, he smothers the flame all by himself. This isn’t the sign of a guy going through a rough patch. This is a sign of a guy who is well past his heyday — a guy who is better suited handing the reigns over to a young gun and transforming into a role player off the bench.

Alright, maybe that’s a little harsh. Jameer can still play, but maybe just not at the level you and I think he can. Let’s get used to it together, take the good games and rejoice, take the bad games in expectation, and live in a little place called the chill zone.

Nate Drexler is a contributing writer for Magic Basketball. Follow him on Twitter.

AP Photo/Charles Krupa

Ah, last week, ‘twas so very long ago. Back in those distant, sunnier times, the Magic were as foals, tottering around in the warming naivete of the new season, kicking their legs and just beginning to grasp their potential as thoroughbreds. It was in those carefree days that J.J. Redick told the Orlando Sentinel, “I like our team. We have a chance to be the best team I’ve been on in my six years with the Magic.” It was a lovely thought, the hopefulness of youth giving itself full, gilded voice until, on Monday night, the Magic played the worst offensive game of the franchise’s history. And now, a week after Redick uttered those charming, misguided words, we know in the harsh glare of hindsight that he might actually be right?

Readers of mine here at Magic Basketball will know that I have been wary of this team from the jump. Astute ones might even accuse me of severe, myopic grouchiness. I wrote at the start of the season that I didn’t think this team could surprise me. I wrote as late as last week that I still think the Magic are better off trading Dwight. My idea was that I was wisely insulating my rationality from my fannish impulses, and that years of organizational incompetence would force the other shoe to drop. I’m not writing today to fully reverse course — my pride prevents such a thing — but the past week has shown me some new things about this team, things I ordinarily don’t even look for as a viewer.

First, we have to discuss Monday night’s game. As one shot after another bricked off against Boston, I was watching with the same sort of morbid self-satisfaction an engineer might feel when he watches a shoddy bridge collapse. All of the conventional wisdom about the team seemed to be coalescing into a dispiriting beat down; I was prepared for days of internet commenters caps-shouting LIVE BY THE THREE, DIE BY THE THREE and talking about how this team isn’t tough because Dwight Howard isn’t tough, and so on and so on.

At around the third quarter, I was ready for every nonsense piece I thought I’d read about the next day, such as “Does Dwight smile too much?” or “Can Dwight ever play with enough of an edge to become really elite?” What I’m saying is, it was an emotionally fraught loss, because it seemed like the worst-case scenario we all could have seen coming was finally happening. The Magic were in a crowded part of their schedule, and the strength of the opposition up to that point had inflated the quality of the team. By the final horn, I was expecting that all of my worst predictions were coming true. But that’s the thing about this sardine can of a season. A single week contains about a twelfth of the team’s total schedule, and assumptions can be challenged pretty quick.

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Photo by Rocky Widner/NBAE via Getty Images

Today is a happy day for me, the culmination of a dream I’ve had lo these many weeks. Or two weeks. This is the week, dear readers, when you stepped up to the plate and offered me not two, not even three, but no fewer than FIVE emails to answer. So dedicated am I to encouraging y’all to participate in the majesty that is Magic Basketball Weekly, I will address all of the emails I received. Which is to say that I will skip my weekly rant to open the column and I will delve right into games of the week.

GAMES OF THE WEEK

Nuggets 108, Sixers 104
Wizards 105, Thunder 102
Spurs 85, Magic 83
I am the cheapest person in the entire world, and for this reason, purchasing NBA League Pass for the first time this season was like getting a volunteer colonoscopy, especially given the fact that it was NOT DISCOUNTED AT ALL for the shortened season. All that said, on Wednesday night, I watched, within five minutes of each other, three of the most exciting finishes so far of the season. It ruled, and it was completely worth getting League Pass. Let me also say this: it completely sucks that the Magic did not beat the Spurs, but I am the sort of rationalizing, mincing, emotionally weak fan who consoles themselves by saying: “If it was that close on the third night of a back-to-back-to back without Turkoglu, I’ll take it!” See? Moral victories! There’s a reason we give them to six year olds!

Jazz 106, Nuggets 96
I feel like the Jazz are trolling me. I hate them. I always have. They are boring and they have a dumb name and for a billion years they had the boringest coach who has ever lived. I can not disassociate the Jazz from decades of hearing television honkeys bloviating about RESPECTING THE GAME every time Jerry Sloan’s crooked nose was shown. I don’t know why they can’t just go away and start sucking like logic says they should. Almost nobody on their team is good, and watching Raja Bell play basketball is like the first time you see your dad being unable to open a pickle jar. It’s depressing. You want me to talk about how much of a mouth breather Enes Kanter is? No. I won’t, because they don’t deserve this much thought. Go away, the Jazz, because you’re pretty decent.

Rockets 90, Hornets 88
I guess I have no idea what the appropriate three letter abbreviation/airport code deal is for New Orleans. Is it really NOLA? Isn’t that just slang for the sorts of fratdoofs who say HOTLANTA? Anyway, the Rockets are like the last good guy left in some art-house war movie, the sort of movie that sets you up for a happy ending where Mr. StrongJawButKindHeart is going to get the girl until WHAM! Right before the credits start, StrongJaw is killed, and Serbians or whoever are traipsing over his body. LIFE IS POINTLESS, THIS MOVIE IS SO SMART. That’s the Rockets.

INTERMISSION

Okay, fine. Quick rant. Dubstep sucks. I hate it. I will confess that I don’t usually get into music that is primarily experiential — i.e. more about the club than the living room hi-fi — but still. It’s sort of exactly what dorky kids who want to have a subculture where they can be cool and piss off their parents would design. WHOA BROA, SKRONKY BASS. DROP THAT SKRONKY BASS, BRUH. THEY’LL NEVER UNDERSTAND US. It isn’t even usually satisfying bass! It sounds like how when I was a little kid I used to blow into cardboard tubes and go durrdurrdurrdurr but also if somebody was trying to fix a zipper next to me doing that. Now, as always, because I am an insufferable elitist, I do have a couple of Metacritic-approved dubstep albums. Like Burial. (Srsly, guuuys, the sampling has so much organic soul behind it hurrhurrhurr). And I understand that I’m supposed to like James Blake, but that just seems like Chris Isaak with a sampler. Two first names on both of em, same pretty boy warble voice. Anyway. I hate dubstep!

Bonus stupid dubstep!

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