There are reasons why I hated growing up in the 80’s (yes, I grew up in the 1900’s kids). The clothing was hideous, the internet didn’t exist, and the hairstyles inspired my hair to fall out. There was one good thing that I loved about the 80’s. The movies. Back To the Future, Ferris Bueller, Die Hard (the greatest Christmas movie ever). While they may be a little outdated, they are still movies I can watch today. I’ve always loved movies. I literally would have gone to movies for every date if the girls weren’t so picky about wanting to talk to me while on the date. I loved movie’s magic ability to transport me to another time and place, but not nearly as much as it’s ability to allow me to not talk for two to three hours.

Unfortunately, recently and ironically, Hollywood, famous for its ability to come up with plots, has lost the plot…for itself. There is not one of my Top 100 movies that have come out since December 2019, which I think was the moment the movie industry lost the plot. Since December 2019, Hollywood has been one big Disaster Movie.

I remember December 2019 vividly. Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker came out, and Disney said they didn’t even care if it made historical money, because Disney was on such a roll they were burning stacks of cash Joker style. In that year, Mary Poppins, Toy Story 4, Lion King, Aladdin, Captain Marvel, and Avengers: Endgame, had already set box office records never to be broken. I remember Disney being so cocky and arrogant, that were talking about buying all the other studios and taking over the world. When a company starts getting high on their own supply, I know deep in my gut that a reckoning is coming. I’ve been wrong about a lot of things, but for this one time, I was right.

I didn’t know what the reckoning would be. I figured it would be another studio or even government intervention slowing it down. Turns out Mice are defeated by poison, and that is what literally slowed the mouse down. A little poison called COVID didn’t just shut people down, it humbled Disney and the movie industry to the core. It shut down their movies, their parks, even their cruises.

Three things happened on or around that horrible Friday, March 13th, 2020. Rudy Gobert (a random NBA player) mockingly rubbed a bunch of microphones, and a few days later got COVID and shut down the NBA. Second, on that Friday, March 13th, my wife and I went to Sam’s Club, to busier than Black Friday crowds, because everyone was stocking up on toilet paper. When I left, I saw a crow and said to myself, “This is an omen of things to come for Disney (or something like that).”

Third, I went to see a movie called Bloodshot starring Vin Diesel, a movie that normally would have been sprinkled with at least a decent audience, but was completely empty and was shut down the next day.

Since then, movie studios in general, and Disney specifically, haven’t made a good decision. Disney + was a disaster, because they released movies on streaming at the same time as theaters. They got too involved in politics, they changed CEO’s, they killed Star Wars, Marvel and Pixar, and even their live action versions of their animated movies are disasters. This year, they’ve put out 7 major movies; Captain America, Snow White, Thunderbolts, Lilo and Stitch, Elio, Fantastic Four, and Tron and only Lilo and Stitch made money. Their parks are having historical low traffic, because of outdated rides and competition from Universal’s new park, Epic Universe, and their cruise lines are having a harder time than the Pirates of the Caribbean.

Not to mention that both the Actor’s and Writer’s Guild’s had almost year long strikes. Disney and Hollywood have definitely lost the plot.

They’re famous for writing plots and yet they can’t seem to write themselves out of the biggest one, which is making movies relevant anymore. As all their writers know, there is a scene in every story where the hero literally or figuratively dies. Hollywood is in the middle of their death scene and they just can’t seem to find a resurrection stone.

While I could see the the Hollywood disaster coming, I haven’t really seen my own impending disaster movie. I guess we all have a blind spot for ourselves. Ben’s Bitter Blog isn’t the same as it used to be. Maybe I’ve lost the plot on what this blog was supposed to be when I started it. Maybe I need to revert back to the good old days, or maybe it’s okay to evolve it to what it is right now. The thing I can’t do is have a blind spot to what it is. It’s a simple concept where I, Ben am Bitter and Blogs about it.

Whatever this blog is, I’m going to keep writing it as long as I have fingers to type or until the neurolink in my head expires, and I can’t think words on the page anymore. In the meantime, here’s some Bitter Friday Gifture’s to keep you bitter about everything.

There was a lot of things to dislike about the 80’s…

The clothing wasn’t…

The good thing about the 80’s for me…

And of course my all time favorite Christmas movie…

Unfortunately and ironically….

Since December 2019…

Between the COVID…

To the dual ill-timed…

The movie industry keeps…

All by themselves, Disney is killing…

Star Wars…

Pixar…

And even their live action remakes…

But maybe I have just as blind of a spot…

Maybe I’ve lost the plot…

Because this blog is supposed to be just three things…

ARRRGGGGHHHHHH

Bitter Lost the Plot Ben