Following up to my last post:

[xiphias]

So, Samuel L. Jackson, apparently, has this thing where he goes, anonymously, to blogs and chatrooms and fora and so forth, and talks to people about how great Samuel L. Jackson is.

And I think that's awesome, and funny, and cute.

But if basically ANY other celebrity did this, I'd think it was scummy, and weird, and creepy, and dishonest.

So -- what is it about SLJ that makes it okay for him?

I mean, if Tom Cruise was doing it -- ick. Then again, that's not fair: if I heard a report stating that Tom Cruise breathes and eats food, I'd consider photosynthesis and gills. But still -- if Wil Wheaton was doing that -- how odd and creepy. If Nathan Fillion or Bruce Campbell did that -- okay, that might be funny, but only if they owned up to it pretty quickly.

Are there any other celebrities that could get away with it?

Comments

[theclamsman.livejournal.com]

Hmm...uhm...I'm not sure.

You know what would be even weirder is if the celebrity would go around chatrooms dissing his own self then arguing with his defenders. ;D

But in Tom Cruise's case if he did that, he'd end up with too much agreement and no one to argue with. >____>

[(Anonymous)]

Obviously, Samuel L. Jackson is just that awesome. And nobody else is, you know.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Thanks for your input, Mr. Jackson.

[blairette.livejournal.com]

Ooh what about this forum topic?
"Vin Diesel: GM from Hell"
- come on, he'd so do it.

[madame-urushiol.livejournal.com]

It would have to be someone with a great sense of humor, like SLJ. It needs to be done in a lighthearted manner. Tom Cruise is a humor-free zone.

[felis-sidus.livejournal.com]

It must be a matter of individual taste. I find it just as icky that SLJ does this as if any of the others you mention were to do it. For me, the icky and sad part is that someone with the kind of talent SLJ has still feels he has to do this kind of thing.

[gingicat]

Yeah, that.

And yet, we just watched the Daily Show (via TiVo) and I found it funny that he was cheerfully talking about how he used the blogosphere to force the studio to use his bidding.

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I find it icky too.

[dancing-kiralee.livejournal.com]

I'm with you... in fact this kind of behavior is a big part of why my reaction to Snakes on a Plane is, "ohhh, yuck," rather than mild disinterest (since it's in a genre I don't follow).

Kiralee

[the-siobhan.livejournal.com]

See, my take on it isn't that he feels he has to, but that he's grooving on the rediculousness of the whole thing.

It's cool because it's silly and he's freely going with the silly.

[bandraoi.livejournal.com]

I think Sean Connery could probably get away with it.

[submarine-bells.livejournal.com]

I think it's skeevy no matter who is doing it. I don't think that SLJ is cool for doing it. But then, I don't have strong opinions regarding SLJ's coolness (or otherwise) anyway. Maybe that's a factor.

[brooksmoses]

I think part of getting away with it, for most any actor, would be that the actual posting is not honestly an astroturf campaign in the sense of trying to boost the movie; one busy actor can't do this very much.

Beyond that, my guess is that a fair bit of it is simply the SLJ mystique. He presumably doesn't need to boost his own ego one bit, and so one assumes that he's not astroturfing for that purpose at all. With the ego-boost completely removed, the only reason left is because he thinks it's funny. And it's funny in a sort of "Ha! Pwned!" sort of way, which is ... well, if you actually like SLJ a fair bit, getting pwned by him personally would be something to be savored as a badge of honor rather than annoyed at. Which isn't really the case for non-badass actors until one gets to serious worrisome hero-worship states.

I think maybe it's a little like Muhammed Ali saying "I am the greatest!" Any doubt in the speakers mind about the truth of the matter makes it into a vain ego-boost, but it can be pulled off if it's said with completely pure conviction.

Or something like that.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Hunh. The Muhammed Ali thing reminds me of the boasting of Mike Fink, and other folktale heroes, and also of some of the boasts that show up in Norse and Germanic eddas. The idea in both of those is that you can make a wild boast, the wilder the better -- but you'd damn well better be able to back it up. You can boast that you can fight a god to a standstill, but you'd damn well expect that a god is going to hear you, and if you CAN'T fight him to a standstill, well, it's gonna be Bad. But if you CAN, that's all cool, and even the god will respect your boast.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I think it's okay that Sam is doing it now, only because so much of the momentum of Snakes is driven by Sam being so obsessively into the project. It would be nothing without his personal marketing efforts, and stealth marketing isn't un-kosher in this particular context, at this particular time.

But if he's still doing it in 2 years, then ick.

[sproutntad.livejournal.com]

I would be surprised if Kevin Smith (of Clerks fame) didn't do it for Clerks 2. It would be very appropriate. :)

[goljerp]

I think Mr. Wheaton would say self-deprecatingly funny things, probably. Actually, he does post sometimes on Fark and Slashdot; while his Slashdot name isn't "WilWheaton", It doesn't take a genius to figure out that someone whose email is listed as wil@@@wilwheaton...net might be, well, Wil Wheaton. And based on his slashdot number, he's had his account for longer than I have...