The Fight That Nearly Destroyed the Letterboxd Community

That includes the squad who made the decision. “The End of Evangelion is some portion of a overmuch wider communicative and a enactment of creation connected its own,” says Letterboxd’s editor-in-chief Gemma Gracewood. “In this case, we admit that our database moderators strive to support a Top 250 that enables movie lovers to observe a period of mostly standalone cinematic excellence, without having needfully to trust connected heavy anterior cognition of a TV show.”

This highly-involved explanation is emblematic for Letterboxd, which has dealt with quieter debates connected akin topics for years. The level allows users to reappraisal miniseries and TV movies but not regular TV shows (for the moment). In the words of 1 of its founders, the determination was made to debar “film-logging being overrun by radical binge-watching Friends,” but borderline cases volition ever exist. What happens erstwhile a miniseries gets a 2nd season? If a amusement has feature-length episodes, are they each TV movies?

To punctuation Megalopolis, the caller contentious movie by Letterboxd idiosyncratic Francis Ford Coppola, the statement is what truly matters. These are the kinds of highly technical, unabashedly nerdy disagreements that signifier the bedrock of virtually each net community. “Film nerds emotion to fertile things,” says movie writer Brandon Streussnig. “We each emotion making our small lists and erstwhile a database doesn't bespeak ours, that idiosyncratic annoyance creeps successful adjacent if it's irrational.”

Streussnig besides notes there’s different affectional component: the movie itself. “[End of Evangelion is] a movie that means much to the radical who emotion it than astir anything. It hits them connected an astir existential level. So to beryllium told that it doesn't suffice arsenic a movie due to the fact that of immoderate made-up reason, [and] truthful can’t beryllium classified among the greats, stings.”

All this is wherefore Letterboxd has recovered truthful overmuch occurrence successful the archetypal place. Fifteen cardinal users whitethorn not dependable similar a precise awesome basal for a societal platform, but it’s tremendous for specified a niche and circumstantial community. Ever since IMDB shut down its connection boards successful 2017, Letterboxd has taken its spot arsenic the halfway of gravity for movie fans online. Actors present regularly list their apical 4 films connected property tours. Luminaries similar Rian Johnson and Ayo Edebiri person active, opinionated accounts, and past period John Carpenter had to personally confirm that helium was being impersonated connected the platform.

As it grows, truthful does the magnitude of its decisions. Letterboxd has had to reverse people before: After months of deleting immoderate reviews of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The Return, Letterboxd officially listed it successful December 2017, aft the Museum of Modern Art and Cahiers du Cinéma some called it 1 of the year’s champion films.

With End of Evangelion, determination wasn’t immoderate higher authority—the determination was wholly down to Letterboxd. Gracewood describes it arsenic an all-hands-on-deck moment, convening “members of the database moderating squad with our editorial, social, community, and information teams to see assorted aspects of the decision.”

Ultimately, aft “a creaseless and speedy process,” End of Evangelion returned to the apical lists aft little than 48 hours. Letterboxd’s users were blessed with the decision, but nary 1 expected the reconciliation to past precise long. “We cognize this won’t beryllium the past clip our assemblage volition fto america cognize what they think,” Gracewood says. It’s an acknowledgement that this is an inevitable portion of the abstraction they’ve cultivated. A societal web dedicated to enactment and creation critique needs to respond to critiques of however they signifier things.

Sure enough, connected October 7, the anime movie Perfect Blue passed The Thing to instrumentality the No. 1 spot the platform’s database of top-rated fearfulness movies. At clip of writing, hundreds of commenters connected X, Reddit, and Letterboxd itself are going backmost and distant implicit whether the movie qualifies arsenic horror. At slightest everyone agrees it’s a movie this time.