First it starts with a comedy video which turns into this weird creepy thing about kids running through the Paris sewers, encountering an alligator, then getting rowed out and into the Seine by a ghost and it cuts to reality and all the nations are going down the river on boats past a bunch of water jets because they’re not doing this in a stadium.
This looks awful and ridiculous. Compare this to the spectacle of London 2012.
Now they’re doing some weird old Hollywood movie musical style musical number with Lady Gaga and she’s on a staircase, which is… somewhere in Paris?
I am so fucking confused.
Edit: They just cut to Macron and he looks as confused as I am.
It’s France. If it weren’t some weird avant-garde art statement, people would probably be disappointed.
It’s just so badly done.
Oh Christ, they’re doing some bad synth can-can thing now.
So you are saying it was more of a can’t can’t?
The can-can was surprisingly poorly synchronized. The later segments were much better performed.
The can-can part was mercifully quick too.
I’ve re-watched that Gojira performance like 10 times. The beheaded Marie Antionettes were <chef’s kiss>.
I’m getting old and have watched a lot of opening ceremonies with all of this art that they have to explain the meaning to you.
In front of an in-person audience of hundreds of world leaders and live to the entire world, the French chose to depict their final monarch that they deposed and beheaded while playing death metal and opera. That’s one of the most badass things I’ve ever seen. And the announcers didn’t have to explain to you how badass it was.
Technically, they had a few more monarchs (Louis XVIII, Charles X, Louis Philippe I) after Marie Antoinette’s husband even if you don’t count the two emperors. The fifth republic looks unlikely to lapse, though
The decapitated Mary Antoinettes singing operatic methal from a palace’s windows were cool.
That wasn’t just cool, it was badass! You can rewatch it here: https://youtu.be/cJowjYixfEs
What country are you in? I can’t see it in the US
Ugh, might be a EU region lock thing. I hate that type of restriction, especially for a global sports Event. The organizers or media have been going after every shred of shared media from the ceremony. It’s ridiculous, do you want to promote you event or not?
Sorry for the rant, but these antiquated copyright behaviors make me angry.
If this is legit a thing that happened I’m kinda mad I missed it.
It was Gojira, a rather famous french metal band, with Marina Viotti, an also famous franco-swiss opera singer.
I had heard that Gojira was playing, and I figured it was their portion.
it was real !!
Ok, now with Celine Dion performing Edith Piaf on the Tour Eiffel I’m getting the peak France feeling I got for peak UK in London 2012, lol
Yep agree.
By far the best part. Celine was astounding and that balloon thingy is outrageously original. The light show too.
There was a metric shitload of what the actual hell going on in the run up to it. Not inherently bad in the main - but just not very well put together. Disjointed, way too drawn out, incoherent.
Thank goodness they had a decent ending.
Who was Parkour Bansky? Does anyone know? Was a tad worried they were going to skitter off a wet roof on live TV.
Edit: Seen Gojira on replay. Excellent.
I was disappointed that part petered out. I didn’t expect to see who was inside, but assumed at some point we’d see them hand the torch back off to the end. Instead it was just like Zizou had it again with no explanation and handed it off to Rafa. I kind of wonder if there was supposed to be something more but they had to cut it because it wasn’t safe to do in the rain. It already seemed a little risky with the segments that were live and had someone running along those wet metal roofs (but was funnier to then see the obviously recorded segments filmed when it was dry and sunny).
I thought the metallic horse running down the Seine was never going to end…
The second half has been much better than the first. The light show on the tower has been great.
I always find it strange when host nations choose performers from the non-host nation. Like why is Gaga there? She’s not French.
I wonder how many celebrated French singers are upset that she opened the performance while mangling the French language? Like, I don’t think she did terrible, but was also clearly not a native speaker
I wonder how many celebrated French singers are upset that she opened the performance while mangling the French language?
The answer is probably none. The Olympics is a celebration of multiculturalism not just the culture of the hosts. If anything, it speaks about the impact of colonialism and historical french cultural hegemony during the XIX century.
Oh, and she does speak french, with an accent, but she does speak it.
Honestly the people who care about this sort of thing are way more upset that a black gasp woman gasp sang rap gasp for the opening ceremony. I’m talking about aya Nakamura.
Gaga, ooh-la-la?
She is even used in memes because one of her lyrics sounds like “I don’t wanna be french” which makes it even funnier
Celine Dion will be there too apparently. I guess she’s from a Francophone part of Canada at least?
Céline Marie Claudette Dion
Nah, sounds English to me.
She’s Canadian. Quebecois. Her parents too. She is descended from French ancestors, but she is not French. Of course, being from Quebec, she speaks French fluently. I’m not sure if people in France can tell she’s Canadian from her accent or the words she uses or whatever. Canadian French is different in some ways from French spoken in France. Not enough to not be mutually understood- similar to the UK and the US.
French with a Canadian partner here. Trust me with some deep-countryside type Quebec folks, we definitely can’t understand anything they’re saying. To be fair, the same could be said about folks in deep rural regions in France…
True about parts of the UK too though. Especially Scotland.
Yes, I go there regularly and same deal, I struggled even more in Ireland but I think that’s because of my Scottish friends I’ve developed a bit of an ear for it.
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Eh, you know what? I like it. Go weird
It’s weird, but not in a good way. Not for me. It’s just so completely disconnected. There’s nothing that unifies it at all. It’s just random weird stuff. Lady Gaga does an old fashioned Hollywood number, sure. There’s a weird Assassin’s Creed faceless person doing parkour with the torch, whatever. Headless Mary Antoinette sings a song. I guess. Robot horse for five minutes… okay… get on with it.
A lady sings Imagine and I hope she doesn’t burn to death because of the GIANT FIRE in the piano behind her? WHAT THE FUCK AM I WATCHING?
…the Aristocrats :D
Welcome to the Olympics this happens every time. Mark my words when the Olympics come to the state we are going to do our damndest to out weird France.
It’ll just be 500 people firing tracer filled machine guns into the air, fireworks being launched off the deck of an aircraft carrier, and a finale centered on an ICBM being detonated offshore to the tune of America, Fuck Yeah!
That’s going to depend rather heavily on who wins the next election.
With the anchors telling viewers, “This flyover is of an F-35 squadron. The program has cost almost 2 trillion. The military has stated it will be using it less going forward. NOW HERE’S BEYONCÉ!”
I was at an air show in Canada a few weeks ago where among other performances they had the F-18s Canada currently uses, the Eurofighter Typhoon that lost the bid to replace the Canadian F-18s, and the F-35 that won the bid to replace the F-18. It was raining that day but the F-18s and Typhoon still performed. The F-35, however, did not; it can’t fly in the rain because its paint will come off. I found that pretty hilarious in juxtaposition. “Thanks for the purchase! Here’s your upgrade that can only fly on nice days! Be sure to tell your enemies to not attack you when it’s raining!”
That’s on the edge - but not out of - the realm of possibility.
I don’t think the US is particularly good at doing ‘fun weird’. We tend to take ourselves too seriously.
Eurovision would never happen in the US for instance.
I wouldn’t say that. London 2012 was an amazing spectacle.
This looks like they spent about 20 Euros on the whole thing.
The horse rider coming down the seine was quite spooky. I’m surprised there hasn’t been any nudity
Did you miss the gender fluid threesome?
YouHadMyCuriosity.jpg
It was at first. After five minutes, it had lost anything that made it impressive to me.
The best part so far for me has been the montages of previous Olympics. Those were terrific.
Right now, I’m feeling sorry for a lady who has to stand there and hold an umbrella over the guy speaking.
I think the problem there is by spreading it out along the Seine it became a little more challenging to balance the presentation for viewers on TV than for people actually watching in person. It takes time for a boat to get from up by Notre Dame all the way down to the Eiffel Tower/Trocadero where the dignitaries were. If they were in a stadium like normal they would’ve just had the horse do a lap and it would’ve been done in a couple minutes because everyone saw it at the same time. Overall I liked it, but I can see how that would get old for some people.
I’ve never understood the spectacle of the opening ceremonies, especially as they got more and more elaborate. Not for me.
You’ll never make it as a dictator. You’ve got to love the spectacles to make it as a dictator. Or so I’m told.
Honestly, I’m mostly scare-watching after the attack on the train this morning. Thankfully, nothing bad has happened so far.
so far I think you ment yet because apparently the French are running out of food and one whole team had to be sent back home. But France is keeping a tight lip about all things.
Lovely. I hadn’t heard that yet.
<Insert clip of the time Crusty the Clown replaced Itchy and Scratchy with an alternative cartoon>
Ok, so now it’s a revenge of the 90s technoparty.
And now it’s a non-pg13 live action smurf (ok, it’s supposed to be Dionisius)
And now it’s Celine Dion singing imagine while riding a reefback on la Seine haha
And I forgot my X.
Yeah, the Smurf was not okay.
I’m pretty convinced at this point that whoever planned this pocketed most of the money.
Lots of people in this thread have never seen Les Miserables
I’m only slightly kidding when I say:
The Olympics are happening this year? I feel like I’m usually really in the loop for these things.
If you are actually heading trouble remembering what years the summer Olympics are in here is something that can help. Summer Olympics, leap years, and us presidential elections are always the same years.
Except for the 2020 Olympics that were in 2021.
And the Winter Olympics used to be the same year as Summer Olympics until 1994.
It was a little boring before, now it feels more like Eurovision haha
It got much better. The horse running down the river gave me chills. I was in Paris a couple of months ago, and this has become quite a feat. The rain made it even more surreal.
