I think Charlie from Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a total non-character. Just utterly blank.
Take Augustus, for example. His ticket was even half-bitten. Sure, he’s a German tub of lard. A total fatso. But! He wants to eat chocolate, so he eats it. He doesn’t worship Wonka, and he doesn’t give a damn about the golden tickets. He just does what he does best, while everyone else was clearing the store shelves looking for a ticket. PLUS, HE SPEAKS WITH A GERMAN ACCENT! He’s the only kid who learned a second language (English) to a conversational level.
So, why did Charlie even win?
Because he didn’t stick his nose in anything.
And why didn’t he stick his nose in anything?
Because he wasn’t spoiled like Veruca Salt?
Yes!
BUT! He is also completely devoid of initiative—unlike Violet and Mike Teavee:
Violet: An absolute leader, an athlete, hyper-focused on winning. She tries the experimental gum because she’s used to being first in everything and pushing new boundaries.
Mike Teavee: Just think about it—a 12-year-old boy hacked an un-hackable contest created by an eccentric billionaire, using probability math and supply-chain ballistics. In our reality, this kid would already be scouted and escorted away by recruiters from the NSA or MIT. Mike isn’t just some ‘angry gamer’; he’s an intellectual titan. Making a child’s outstanding intellect his main vice is a really bizarre message for a children’s movie.
And who wins in the end? Spineless Charlie. A boy whose ambitions are so atrophied that when a crazy chocolatier offers him an industrial empire, he… refuses. He’s too afraid to step out of his cozy, warm little swamp.
Or maybe that was the plan all along? Perhaps Wonka needed a blank slate—a compliant yes-man who wouldn’t argue, wouldn’t remodel the factory to fit his own vision, and would just blindly follow orders. In essence, Wonka chose the perfect heir for his slave-labor empire (because, let’s be real, his Oompa Loompas work for food).
Charlie Bucket will never innovate, never automate the Oompa Loompas’ labor, and never optimize taxes. He will just sit in his chocolate paradise, just like his father sat in that freezing shack.
Speaking of his dear old dad!
A man who has four grandparents rotting on a single bedsheet in his house loses his job as a toothpaste cap-screwer (literally, his job was to screw caps onto toothpaste tubes). And what does he do? He just sits in his hovel and whines.
BUT! In the finale of the film, we see this ‘Mr. Bucket’ calibrating and repairing the exact machine that replaced him. This is a key detail. It means he isn’t just some uneducated, unskilled laborer. He is a skilled mechanic. An engineer. A man who understands kinematics and automation. In an industrial world, a skilled mechanic is a king. As long as the gears are turning, engineers will be in high demand.
But this guy… he just didn’t look for work. He found it much more comfortable to play the victim of progress, waiting for his destitute son to bring home some dirt-cheap cabbage-leaf soup.
If someone is capable of disassembling, repairing, and upgrading a highly complex industrial robot, they are a top-tier specialist. In the real world, a person like that wouldn’t sit around in a crumbling shack watching his family starve. His passivity isn’t a ‘tragedy of poverty’—it’s a professional paralysis of will. He was just waiting for the world to solve his problems for him.
And this movie presents this family to us as paragons of virtue?
Federal Surveillance Center K-21B
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Federal_Surveillance_Center_K-21B
The Brotherhood of Steel are such assholes. I'm exploring this bunker, finally reach the bottom, and find a terminal to look up the lore and history of this place, only to see... 'DATA EXPUNGED. Ad Victoriam.'
Hey everyone, I noticed some weird things on the world map in Fallout 4 that completely contradict the lore:
US and Canada: Why are they still divided by a border? According to the lore, the US fully annexed Canada in 2076 after years of occupation.
USSR vs. Russia/CIS: Why do we see the modern borders of the Russian Federation and CIS countries instead of the Soviet Union? In the Fallout universe, the USSR never dissolved and lasted until the Great War of 2077.
The Mediterranean Sea: And most importantly, what happened to the Mediterranean? It's filled with the same green color as the land, just like the Black, Caspian, and Baltic seas. Could the Atlantropa project have been implemented in the Fallout timeline?
Is there an in-game lore explanation for this? Or is it just lazy developers?
was asking about the Fallout universe lore. I know that according to the lore, the Gauss rifle was invented by Germany. Which side was the first to use it on the Anchorage front? In theory, it should have been China, using the Gauss rifle as a way to counter power armor. But in the simulation, I didn't see a single Chinese soldier with a Gauss rifle. Only on the posters.
Based on this in-game Chinese propaganda poster from the Operation: Anchorage DLC, it looks like the PLA (People's Liberation Army) was actually the first to deploy the Gauss rifle in Alaska. Is that lore-accurate? Did the US military only start using Gauss tech after capturing and reverse-engineering Chinese models?
According to Fallout lore, the NCR defeated the Brotherhood of Steel. Just regular infantry taking down an army of power-armored troops.
Plus, the Metro 2033 universe has some similar stuff too. https://metrovideogame.fandom.com/wiki/Exoskeleton
You can read more about the Pride City here: https://lemmy.world/post/47087243
Judging by this footage, a group of soldiers with Kalashnikovs can take down power armor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiO8id3Supc
But yeah, the Enclave objectively surpasses the Federals in technology and logistics. Just remember how they crossed the entire USA from the west coast to the east coast on Vertibirds (2,500 miles). Meanwhile, the Federals barely managed to get from Omsk to Yekaterinburg (around 500 miles).
On the other hand, the Enclave is clearly inferior in numbers. In Fallout 2 (at the peak of their power), the Enclave’s total population ranged from about 1,000 to 1,200 people, including workers, politicians, and scientists.
You can read more about the Federals here: https://lemmy.world/post/44415646
The NCR helmet, judging by the sound of the fall, is made of metal. a thin sheet metal bender.
Which is logical. In the wastelands, trees are scarce, but scrap metal is everywhere.
I guess it’s more rigid than a boonie? Might be a ballistic helmet with a pith covering?
It is made of compressed bamboo.
I'll add this. That 4-family house was demolished long ago, and a 2,000-unit apartment building was built in its place. However, those 16 people planted a Christmas tree in Trezor's grave. It still stands.
There's a lot of variation in the numbers for the number of victims, isn't there?
In fact, it's quite common. An executioner for some, a savior for others.
In my opinion, it's a five-round AVS-36. It's difficult to see in the photo.
Moreover, the Lend-Lease program for the USSR began after the Siege of Leningrad. Western weapons would not have been available there.
Why am I getting negative ratings? This is also a story.
I have the "Creation Club" add-on installed. The dogs are from there