tf when no Edwardian gf

Edwardian novelists did anime girls BEFORE anime girls were cool.

Have you seen 'Nicholas and Alexandra' made in 1971? A great film, and Olivier's Count Witte gives such a remarkable speech on hearing that Germany has declared war on Russia that goosebumps do not begin to cover it: 'None of you will be here when this war ends. Everything we fought for will be lost, everything we've loved will be broken. The victors will be as cursed as the defeated. The world will grow old, and men will wander about, lost in the ruins, and go mad. Tradition, restraint, virtue, they'll all go. I'm not mourning for myself, but for the people who will come after me, they will live without hope. And all they will have will be guilt, revenge, and terror. And the world will be full of fanatics and trivial fools.'

Starts fairly slowly, but gets better and better and ends on a detonation of truth.

14:00 Even more audacious of a retcon is the game merging white racial solidarity with exploitative capitalism. In the early 20th, working class populism was incredibly racist, with immigration restrictionism being a prime focus, and the Jim Crow south voting solidly blue. The DR3/Demonkkkrats meme is a thing for a reason. And the early Progressive movement was one of the first proponents of eugenics (Which makes that one early scene where a man says to booker "I'm on your side, I'm a proggresive!" extremely laughable)

The thing about the Brahman caste is so true. I even notice this when i work in indian dominated factories, the supervisors or anyone with rank resigns themselves to pointing around and saying "do this' do that" to the point where one particular manager who frequently stands around doing little work even yelled out to me half way across the factory floor stopping me from what i was doing to pick up some boxes sitting at his feet only to look stunned when i told him to pick them up himself because i was busy. This is a stark contrast to other work places in Australia where managers and supervisors do their fair share of the work taking a more hands on approach as they delegate and manage the people under them.

That ending was one of the most upsetting things in my recent memory.

Wow, this the first time I've been black and white pilled and I don't know how to feel about it. Just...wow.

The secret garden really is a wonderful story. A sickly girl on the fringe of identity, returns to her source, which she has to reconnect with to restore herself and the world. The garden image for a return and restoration of eden itself after the fall is fantastic. And it manages all of those ontological themes, within the relm of the contemporary world. Little surprise it feels so magical.

That contrast between violence and story is what amplified our protective instincts and bonded us with Elizabeth-- We were the big daddy in infinite.

Just got to the ending of the video. WW1 truly was the death of the west.

You make such highbrow content that even the shitposting in the comments is on a whole other level.

The absolute restraint not to put 'Mary-Sue' in the title

I can already tell this is one of your videos I will return to and watch multiple times.

My biggest gripe with Infinite is that it's message isn't anything spectacular. Even at the time, when I was relatively bluepilled compared to now, I thought the themes and morals of the story were uninteresting. Everybody knows slavery is wrong, everybody already believes racism is bad. This isn't biting commentary, these are mainstream opinions that are conditioned into us at a young age, and Infinite fails to add any nuance. Compare that to the inspired setting of Rapture and it's commentary on Objectivism and free will, and it just seems juvenile in comparison. And that's not even mentioning the multiple worlds crap and the watered-down gameplay. At least the art direction held up. I hope System Shock 3 turns out well...

Remembers when Spoony was good Heck, I remember when Spoony was a movie reviewer writing dead-tree articles in KotDT but got run out by readers who didn't get his schtick.

I don't think we can even contextualize the absolute miserable and traumatic hell that was the first world war. I don't think we'll ever recover from it...

When I first played the game, I thought the game was foreshadowing that if you didn't pull Elizabeth from the clutches of those who coveted her powers then she'd inadvertently give everyone cancer, or maybe she opened up the gateway to a dimension where unspeakable horrors roamed freely. When it turned out the big threat was a city of old-timey racists with God and Steampunk on their side, it was rather underwhelming. Also it felt like a massive ripoff as they raised questions they weren't even going to pretend to try to address, like what was going on in the dimension where all the friendly robots were coming from.

That’s so sad about her children in WWI. Wow. What a horrifying moment in European history.

An absolutely lovely video! Well done! Is the transcript available anywhere?

Infinite's setting always struck me as deeply anti-American, anti-White and anti-Christian trite

The British colonies on the whole costed the British money, There wealth came from being the first country to normalize the profit motive.

Not going to lie, I do not listen to others for almost a full hour often, but this was such an interesting ride that I stuck to the very end. And not just that, you made me think about what was being said, so by all means, congratulations on a well done project.

Also the gameplay is just bland when compared to the original bioshock. I can't believe Ken Levine went from Thief: the dark project, System shock 2 and bioshock.... To this mess. I remember an interview on which he claims that the inspiration behind Elizabeth came when he had a date with a girl who just left from an abusive relationship uuuum okaaaay Kevin....that's weird. Fun fact: my grandfather hates Alice in wonderland because how illogical it is to his more mathematical approach, ironic considering that Lewis Carroll was a mathematician

very interesting take as always. Loving this series so far. just a little tip = next time, don't use background music with words in it.. it's a bit too loud and distracting at times.. Nothing big. Thanks and God Bless!

appreciate the better production value 10/10

Man the trolls are out in this comment thread

This video made me remember why I subscribed to your channel in the first place three years ago beyond my tribal need, as a recent convert(revert), of finding Catholic youtubers of reactionary persuasion. You not only provide food for thought. Your video-essays are aesthetic experiences in and of themselves. This one made me sick with nostalgia for the ethos of another era. I want to commend you and thank you for that.

The very last point you make about WW1 is interesting. I thought of a similar idea after listening to Dan Carlin's Blueprint for Armageddon.

Another well-woven analysis. It is a bit ironic that the explosion of ingénue characters in this era of neo-puritanism acts as a foil to the surge of curious, intelligent, and flawed female characters during the Edwardian era.

The should have honestly stuck with the original dark aesthetic, with the older "Comstock" Booker, the mute Gibson girl Elizabeth and the steampunky weapon designs.

I feel like the game's depictions of baptism is probably its worst part. Every individual example of it in the game is an attempt at blasphemy or a criticism of the idea of God's grace.

Sometimes I feel like these videos were custom made for me. We seem to have both been touched and impacted by many of the same pieces of art and had similar realizations. I was only in middle school when I played Bioshock Infinite and knew nothing of politics, but even then I felt this strange spiritual connection to it like even though I was being told that the world of Columbia was bad, it seemed like a near perfect sort of dream for me. Although I always felt that, I never really knew what it was I was feeling exactly until I watched this video. You expressed it perfectly. You are very wise, sir. God bless you.

Once again you've given me the food for thought analysis that I crave. Thank you. The structure of your monologues is always extremely well organized. It almost feels like a walk through of your thought process. The closing statement was chilling.

My god, Distro. You just struck something deep in me, I have no words. Keep up the great work .

Best part of: Bioshock: The Story Bioshock 2: The Gameplay Bioshock Infinite: The Porn

>bioshock infinite has brain LMAO nice joke

I'm a pretty cold person and I can't remember the last time I cried, but this ending made me cry

Elizabeth didn’t ruin bioshock Infinite, she was one of the best parts.

As GK Chesterton once said, Ceaser believed himself more than anyone.

Hey Dave, seeing you recently tackling post-modern topics, I was wondering when you were going to address the issue of deterritorialization and how much has been magnified thanks to globalization.

I was wondering how you were going to pull off a decent ending to this in the final 10 minutes. And then you brought it round to WW I, and somehow, the ending was abrupt, yet final, like the last hammer strike driving a nail home.

This was a great video very well done.

That was beautifully done. I was completely immersed the whole time. So cozy with the music and imagery of the garden. Really great job, that's my favorite video to date. "The world has become sad because a puppet was once melancholy" - Oscar Wilde

I was really disconcerted, when you referenced Spoony1. It took me a moment to remind myself that at one point he was actually producing insightful content.

Back again. Still one of the finest videos on youtube.

That ending. WWI commentary when?

I'd add to the reasons Elizabeth isn't really a marry sue is that she doesn't stay pure and optimistic she eventually becomes disenchanted and slowly declines the more she learns about the real world until she more or less becomes evil or at least morally grey in part one of burial at sea

I so wanted to hear "by and by" while this was playing, was worth the wait

Have you seen the recent adaptation of Anne of Green Gables on Netflix? Let's just say you would not be remotely surprised by the changes from the source material.

"technically well-done" That is a controversial opinion, it's at best 3/4 ass

When the fratricidal ambitions That line. I come back this video at least once a week. It's so powerful to me for reasons I can't quiet explain.

...Why does Dave know of ahegao? >_>

Back once again. I kiss my children (2 girls and a young boy) and tell them be good, the west is not lost.

I'm befuddled you could enjoy Secret Garden and Anne of Green Gables so much as a young boy, as a little girl I struggled through those books on multiple occasions, determined to finish but I never could. I just found them too boring. I think appreciating those types of stories requires you not be exposed to the plot driven stories that dominate modern storytelling. Older books like those were definitely of a different era in that people could legitimately enjoy a chapter where all the characters do is cook a dinner. There are still modern stories being written like that such as Pond by Claire Bennett but they tend to be very short comparatively.

Bioshock Infinite held back too many punches in some areas and tended to overthink certain story or gameplay elements.. Edit: I genuinely enjoyed listening to you talk about Edwardian books and completely forget this was about Elizabeth from Bioshock

This was a beautiful video and a much needed one to remind the modern West of what it has lost in its endless quest for "progress." May we return to virtue, grow a heart, and humbly tend the hearth.

i remember skipping bioshock infinite when it came out. For me, vidya peaked at Borderlands 2. Who needs a ham-fisted story when you have a perfectly good meat-bicycle?

This might be my favorite video essay on KZfaq

I still like Bioshock 2 better than Infinite

Love the channel. Your cultural commentary is a breath of fresh air in the age of "acceleration or bust". Pax et bonum.

This is beautiful Dave. The right video at the right time (that's subjective, I know).

Something tells me Bioshock Infinite’s credits look like a Tel Aviv phonebook

Brilliant review! Summed up alot of my thoughts about the game

system shock will always remains superior

Just wow 😮

The radical change in global culture that occurred in the late 2012/early 2013 brings me to belive that Mayan calendar is metaphorically right and we now live in the new era of human history. The former 5125 years marked by order, commonalities and respect towards the people that came before came to pass. The next five millennia will be the time of chaos, uncertainty and uprooted, atomized individuals.

0:00 “I wanna tell the story of the worst movie adaptation I’ve ever seen.” 1:26 Last Time: Bioshock This Time: Bioshock Infinite ♾ 3:30 “ It was game that really could only be made in 2013” Protagonist: Booker DeWitt, gruff Detective 5:07 The Plot builds to a _Surprising Twist_ 6:52 Why did The Distributists Opinion of the game change? • Good elements, poor mixture 8:34 • Mismatch between gameplay (1st person shooter) and story ( redemption and change) (I’m Progress, Be Back In a bit) 11:30 A Turning Point For Video Game Criticism 15:23 False Equivalency? 17:40 Elizabeth, Compassion and Grace. The Angel, The Mary Sue. 22:53 _In search of an Edwardian Archetype_ 30:00 *_The Secret Garden_* 34:30 The Bhramin And The Aristocrat 35:54 *_Alice In Wonderland_* by Lewis Carrol • Alice, The Supreme Rationalist, Common Sense And Sensibility 40:00 Tim Burton’s _Alice In Wonderland_ (Underland) • An Inferior Product • Boring Alice 45:25 • An Insult To Viewers 47:00 • Rebel Alice 48:45 *_Despite The Many Evils, There Was A Code Goodness Within The West_* 51:24 Alice Little • Upper Class English Girl • Married, had some kids, • Renowned Hostess 52:54 • WWI Took Her Children Away 😭

I had good teachers at primary school in the 80s. They read good book like the secret garden. Strangely, the only detail I remembered when you first mentioned it was the gardener referring to "Daffydowndillies". However, it all came back to me like a bow-wake as you gave your synopsis. Regarding Alice in Wonderland, John D Barrow puts forth the idea that it is, in part, a mockery of modern mathematics and physics.

This is probably the smartest thing Ive seen in the Internet

Background music and projector sound are a tad too loud.

Lewis Carroll wasn’t a pedophile but Sir James Barrie the author of Peter Pan probably was

You want Edwardian femininity? Jenny Agutter in the Railway Children (1970). The impact of seeing that film as an adolescent lives with me to this day :-)

Somehow it doesn't surprise me at all that the makers of Bioshock infinite don't ... Know history at all ...

About Elizabeth's Mary Sue status, do the flaws count if they are from a blindspot or incoherence on the part of the writers? It poked its head on rare occasions, but she definitely had a lot of spite in her. Then there was that part where she first gloms on to the revolution cause she was reminded of Les Miserables. My immediate reaction was to recall The Reign of Terror and Emperor Napoleon. Not sure if this was naivete set up for a harsh dose of reality or the dissonance between progressive wank fantasies of revolution and the game needing more hostiles for you to shoot.

History is complicated, there are certainly virtues that existed back then, which exist less these days. But these were fundamentally flawed times too. My own town's history is a testament to the virtue and the deep rooted problems of that society. It was built and developed in the 1860s by an aristocrat industrialist who developed it into the largest slate producing town in the world. He was a deeply competent man, and an aristocrat who exemplified Victorian virtues by treating his workers very well, and ensuring that he listened to the association of quarrymen. He'd set fair wages, he built a hospital that provided free healthcare and was generally a shining example of the virtues you speak of in this video. His son on the other hand, ignored his people and treated his workers preferentially on religious grounds. He changed the system of wages, and the end result was the longest industrial strike in history followed by over a century of resentment. Such degrees of unchecked power leads both to great things when wielded well and awful things when wielded poorly. There's truth to your rosy eyed nostalgia for the Edwardian period. But that doesn't mean Bioshock Infinite's critiques aren't also a fair reflection on that time period too. History is complicated.

the best Game from irrational was swat 4

Excellent analysis. I loved the credits too. It was a very nice touch, I teared up a bit.

Another great video. I saw a video a few weeks ago where someone referred to Bioshock Infinite as politics in games done right, I knew he was wrong, but I couldn't put into words as well as you can.

Not gonna lie didnt think distributist gave this much of a shit about video games.

This is a master piece, Dave!

You always pick the best music for your vids.

I hope this comment doesnt get lost in the hundreds below and above. To put it blunty as a leninist-marxist I agree with you. The general consensus in commie academia up to the 80's was that from economic, military, cultural and even spiritual point of view the capitalist world reached its height in the Edwardian era. From Bismarkian Germany to Meji's Japan and of course the edwardian empire itself the capitalist world was the most cultivated form ever achieved in most of the world (it can be made the case that muslim and hindu worlds faced decline at the time, but this is already repeted ad nauseam by the liberals and does not dismiss the fact that it represented the highest form of society across most of europe, the anglosphere and Japan). This position defended by imtelectuals such as Rose Luxemburg, Lenin (related in present tense as he lived it) David Harvey, Eric Hosbawn, Peter Anderson, Carlos Mariategui and so on was even seen as an argument for the socialist revolution as the only way forward was breaking the system as the french revolution did with the feudal absolutism of the xviii century. Even more, I share your disgust for the progresive intelectual blindness to the past. Whereas the soviets could not but behold the inner beauty of late german opera and french ballet declaring that they should not longer be the privilege of the elite but socialized for all; the conteporary SJW sees it all and discards it as reactionary racist propaganda. No words can express the level of ira one develops against them. Yet, having shared with you this marxist comment on the subject, I must declare too that this edwardian world was doomed to fail, as the intrinsecal reasons that allowed the rise of the european world to this power were the same that pushed for the final war for supremacy. In all its sadness that beautiful era opened in 1815 could not end otherwise than in the bloodbath of verdun. Awesome video, you have earned a suscriber.

Maybe instead of being a flying history lesson, Columbia should have been its own society. Rapture wasn’t what the 50s look like, right?

Truly devastating critique. Lovely

Elizabeth is not intended to be the judge of Infinite. You're thinking of Tenenbaum in Bioshock, who acts as your conscience throughout the game. Elizabeth is a reaction fo Columbia. She starts off as innocent, naive, and idealistic, dreaming of a better world. This is why she cares so much about the Vox. Because she's naive enough to think that there are no downsides to a revolution and fails to consider anything that might go wrong. Once she sees the Vox attacking innocents, scaring them away from their homes or else taking them hostage to torture them, she begins to take on a different opinion. She becomes broken and disillusioned. She becomes a cynic like Booker and, eventually, begins to internalize and incorporate the hatred that she sees coming from the Vox, this time hurling these feelings towards her mother, who she believed abandoned her and was the cause of her isolation from the world. She tried to mutilate Lady Comstock's corpse with the justification that removing her hand will get them through Comstock House, but even Booker can tell that she's just using this as an excuse to revenge herself upon the deceased woman. After finding all the Tears that show them what happened between Lady Comstock and the Prophet, if the player saves the Lutece Lab Tear for last, there is a conversation between Elizabeth and Booker regarding the purpose of the Tears and what the Luteces wanted Elizabeth to find. Elizabeth thinks that there is some sort of scientific reason for them needing to find the Tears, only for Booker to say, "They want you to understand her." Upon hearing this, Elizabeth realizes that she has been mistreating her mother, as well as her mother's memory (as there is an implication that the living version of Lady Comstock is based on her misconceptions of her), and makes it a point to apologize and finally make amends. Your attempt to equate Elizabeth to the Mary Sue is poor. Elizabeth's character is flawed, and it remains open to growth. Elizabeth's story is not one of judgment over Columbia, but a response to humanity in general, as well as a warning to Booker as to what might happen if he fails to prioritize Anna over his attempts to numb the pain of his past, as the Comstock House level is a somewhat heavy-handed metaphor for parental abuse/ abandonment. On a final note, neither Infinite nor Bioshock are critiques of what you think they are. Infinite is not a critique of the West, Bioshock is not a critique of Objectivism. Both are a criticism of people, much like Southpark. In Bioshock, while there were criticisms of Objectivism in it, ultimately left the fall of Rapture open to interpretation. Every character had a different explanation for it; Ryan thought it was in a transitional period, Tenenbaum thought that it was her only scientific research that ruined the city, Fontaine (being a cynic) thought that Ryan's ideals were doomed from the start, and various Splicers blamed the lack of religion. The truth is that they were all wrong (except for maybe Fontaine). As Ken as put many times, Utopia "still had the people." In a similar vein, Infinite is about the Horseshoe Theory, declaring a warning that both sides of a conflict might begin to prioritize winning the battle over the ideals that they began fighting for. While Infinite does focus heavily on the dark side of American history, its goal isn't to say "America is bad." Its goal, much like the franchise as a whole, is to say that people are bad and are capable of ruining any ideology, no matter had strong. As such, it had to show the worst sides of America just like Bioshock had to show the worst side of Objectivism. I'd hardly call it anti-American propaganda, especially when the character's goals focus primarily on saving themselves in the end, and no one else.

Your discussion of the difference between the aristocrat and the Brahmin made me think of the Poldark novels (And the TV show). Was wondering if you were familiar with that story?

Very good critique, thank you for sharing

Oh the Edwardian era....what could've been....

Oh boy, what a magnificent conclusion

Powerful video, very well done

Incredible take, of great personal resonance for me. I am attempting to bring back the Victorian girl archetype in a series of novels, so we shall see if certain cultural trends can be defied.

Always thought provoking, thank you. Are you familiar with Gertrude Himmelfarb?

You keep on saying that Columbia has an "Art Deco" look. Rapture is the one with an Art Deco look, in 1912 art deco wouldn't pop up until 30 years later. Columbia has a more colonial art style.

For the n-th time Dave, "infamous" means "living in infamy", not fame. "Famous" and "infamous" are opposite, not interchangeable.

Well done sir

list of music?

Never read the book, but as a young boy I watched the film adaptation of 'The Secret Garden', and found it similarly enchanting.

Dark Souls Dave, you’ll love it.

Beautiful video essay