Trevor

I remember really wishing that I had trick-or-treaters at Halloween, they would have been fun to give out, but this condo is all old people with tiny dogs (and me). Should have given them to a friend with a neighborhood full of kids.

hindolio

ah ha! but june is when i will sort through my collection for sci-fi stuff to watch, organize them into potential viewing orders, categoriz... ah nvm. its in july. my bad

indy2003

I'm pretty new to the forum; have browsed the bargains section at times but didn't actually get involved until I was told about the challenges by a friend. Anyway, just wanted to say that I immensely enjoyed participating in the Historical challenge last month and I'm looking forward watching lots of cool stuff for Sci-Fi/Fantasy month, too.

Anyway, I just wanted to echo the thoughts of those who have suggested comedy and crime challenges. The latter in particular would cover a lot of stuff that doesn't really seem to be covered by most of the current challenges. Just wanted to throw that out there. Cheers!

Trevor

Welcome!

Yeah, my story is similar. Mainly just lurked the bargain forum until I found a Challenge. Only then I did I start to feel like this was a community where each of us could contribute and make the place better as a whole.

I think we're getting close to Challenge overload, but would like to somehow see the missing genres covered. Maybe crime could be lumped with action/adventure. Also think maybe Comedy would be a good complement for the partial month November Holiday Challenge. I'm not going to push either though.

caligulathegod

Personally, I think we might be saturated with challenges. It makes them less special when they are constantly running. Plus, comedy or drama might be a bit too broad. There's plenty of each in the accepted challenges.

Trevor

But I think it only makes them "less special" to us diehards who play in all or most of them.

The whole idea of Challenges is to get people involved in the forum, and many or perhaps even all of the current Challenges don't appeal to a large demographic. They are largely niche genres. A more general Challenge like comedy, drama, or action may pull in a group of DVDTalkers who we are completely missing right now.

Right now, the vast majority of films (standard dramas and comedies, and most action/adventure films) don't apply to any Challenge.

John Sinnott

I don't have a strong opinion one way or another, but I wonder if broader genres challenges would have the same community feeling that the niche ones do. I have lurked a little in a couple of challenges before jumping in for the first time this month, and the thing that makes them appealing to me is seeing what others are watching and getting ideas from that, and there's often a good amount of overlap between lists. I'm not sure we'd get that with something like 'comedy' where a slapstick fan might not like gross-out humor and neither of those guys would want to watch romantic comedies.

On the other hand you could come up with a killer checklist for some of the broader genres. "A romantic comedy with at least one fart joke."

Trevor

Good points. But then, there are pretty broad ranges in some of the existing Challenges too.

I know that I'd probably skip any drama or comedy Challenge personally, but think that as long as someone is willing to be the lead, and at least one other person participates, then it's a good thing for DVDtalk.

No one without extreme OCD (myself included) should even think about participating in every Challenge. The average DVDTalker would probably be in one or two of them, and maybe rotate which ones they do every year.

Board activity is much lower than it was a few years ago, right? At least it feels that way to me. If each new Challenge gets a handful of people excited about visiting the site, then we are all better off in the long run.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I think the make your own challenge is perfect for the types that don't all into any other challenge. I've grown much more fond of it after actually doing it than I though I would.

The only challenges I don't really get into are the Awards and Holiday one. I have a short list of Awards movies I plan on watching, so I'll do it this year but I don't really go out of my way enough to watch holiday stuff and keep track of it.

caligulathegod

I believe the niche factor is what makes these challenges what they are. These are films that most people would watch only on a lark, if they watch them at all. It's a time to focus on them and give them a bit more attention and it's their relative rarity in our daily viewing that makes it interesting to watch 100 of them, or however many you watch. If it is just about the same mundane entertainment we expose ourselves to on a daily basis, then it's not as special and it becomes little more than publicly logging your daily viewing. Comedy and drama are just too broad and mundane to be a challenge, outside of the make your own challenge where you put your own spin on them. Plus, there's plenty of comedy and drama in the other challenges.

There's only a few weeks here and there between challenges. I think that's about right. Maybe some stuff can be swapped out.

davidh777

I've been on this forum for years and played sheep games etc. but don't recall ever hearing about these challenges. Not till one of the recent bargain threads, when someone said they'd pick up something because it would work in one of the challenges. That's when I ran across the June and July installments, and I was excited because (1) war/Westerns and sci-fi/fantasy are two of my biggest unwatched piles and (2) DVDTalk was obviously using these to fill the summer months when there's no major network TV! OK, wrong on that second point, but I have participated in June and July and found them fun. I probably wouldn't go for horror or exploitation, or even Criterion though that's also a large pile--just not superhigh priority for me. On the other hand, I would like to catch up on some Kurosawa, and one of the things I like about the challenges is that you can participate at any level you want. Rashomon and Sanjuro alone would still qualify.

CardiffGiant

Since I mentioned it to Trevor in the Historical Challenge thread, I thought it would be good to mention it here, too: I don't mind taking over the Criterion Challenge this coming September. As long as this B&N sale goes as planned, I should have some more titles to add to the mix. I definitely like the goals regarding supplemental materials. Part of what makes Criterion media so great are the wealth of supplemental materials on most discs. I'm sure I'm not alone when I say that I don't visit those materials nearly enough.

Trevor

If we ever have a Challenge for November, I suggest it be a TV Challenge. That would blend nicely with the Holiday Challenge which begins the last week of November and allows TV viewing.

The Challenge goal could be to watch 100 episodes of television I guess.

I have hundreds of seasons of TV on DVD, but seem to rarely get to them because most of them don't fit any of our Challenges.

Cardsfan111

That's why I used the "Make-Your-Own-Challenge" to watch exclusively TV-on-DVD. Aside from the sci-fi or holiday episodes (and now it includes horror), I had a mountain of unwatched material I was never getting to and it provided me the needed motivation to dig into it.

Travis McClain

This is really just part of your insidious plot to make TV content eligible for every challenge, where each episode counts as one entry, isn't it?

I would actually posit that, with all the Black Friday deals around the corner, early November would be a great time for an Unwatched Pile challenge. Something to help us justify those piles of $2 and $3 DVDs we're hoping to walk away with on Black Friday. Sort of a housekeeping type challenge, y'know?

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I wouldn't mind doing that one.

Dimension X

There's obviously some interest in this since about a quarter of the MYOC Challenge participants did TV Challenges. "If you build it, they will come."

This sounds a little too much like the MYOC Challenge to me.

Trevor

Nah, we already have 12 unwatched challenges every year, MP's own monthly unwatched threads.

Travis McClain

Perhaps I'm to blame for this; I made my Unwatched Pile my personal MYOC theme this year. Besides, the Drive-In Challenge is basically just Horror Lite; why not a year-end, justify-your-purchases challenge?

As for Trevor's remarks that there's already such a monthly challenge, I think that's debatable. It's not really a challenge, and I suspect a lot of forum members assume it's just an ongoing repository for massive lists posted by our more prolific consumers. Just looking at the page view numbers, I suspect that few DVD Talkers so much as open an Unwatched Pile thread.

The other nice thing about an Unwatched Challenge in November is that the month is already going to lose a week to the Holiday Challenge. If, as Trevor suggests, you want to finally make time for some TV content, that's perfectly allowed. Maybe you're exhausted from consecutive challenges and want to gorge on stand-up comedy and concert videos; fine. The point is, an Unwatched Challenge is by design so participant-specific that its shortened duration should be unimportant.

Trevor

Kind of like how 99% of forum viewers never look at any Challenge thread?
Oh, it wouldn't be shortened. Challenges are mutually exclusive of each other. But out of respect for our best Challenge, the Holiday Challenge, if we ever do one in November it should be something that could "double count" that last week.

If anyone wants to do an "Unwatched Challenge" we have 12 monthly avenues for them to do so. To "waste" a month for something already covered doesn't sound like a good idea to me. We have or could come up with 20 or more great ideas for monthly Challenges, but only have 12 months.

Just my opinion obviously.

Dimension X

Well I kind of sold the Challenge that way.
I don't see it that way. There are plenty of [fill-in-the-blank]xploitation films to fill a month without eating into October's Challenge.

HyperWeather

I love the idea of a TV challenge in November, to blend into the last week with the Holiday challenge, I have way to many unwatched (or rewatch) tv sets. Would force me to be more creative with my MYOC next year.

Travis McClain

I've thought about it some more, and I'm on board with a TV challenge. One caveat: I'd like to see it allow for "special interest" releases. Not porn, but things like stand-up comedy specials, concert videos...you know, the kinds of things that might be shown on TV, but exist really more as a home video release.

caligulathegod

Horror lite?

Trevor

I really like that, adding specials and concerts. I have dozens of DVDs that are even more unique, and not really films, so they would be good in this group. Things like DVD "magazines", shorts that were likely never in theaters, documentaries, etc.

I'll pencil you in for Challenge lead.