Kulturkampf

[PhoenixDark]

https://variety.com/2024/tv/news/star-wars-lord-of-the-rings-bridgerton-toxic-fans-hollywood-response-1236166736/


There's a pretty simple solution and it doesn't involve coddling manchildren: hire better writers and make better shows/films. Or at least that would be the simple solution in a world where making good things was the goal, instead of making slop for specific demographics to consume. I remember when Fellowship Of The Ring came out and there were some LOTR message boards that were very critical of the changes. A lot of the Arwen stuff in that movie - making her a quasi warrior princess who out-rangers Aragorn and saves Frodo - would be viewed as "woke" or mary sue today. The manchildren will never admit that though, or they'll try to move the goal posts ("but it wasn't forced into my face nonstop back then!"). The fact is that most book readers didn't give a shit and loved the movie. And those who disliked the film still had their own space to argue and it never really felt that toxic.

To me the bigger problem is that so many writers do not read and don't appreciate art that doesn't coddle them or reinforce their worldview. This is how we produce allegedly literary people who don't read classic English literature because it's too white or too patriarchal. For television/film adaptions this is how you constantly get writers saying things like "I never read the books or saw the original film(s)." And these are the people who are constantly brought onto projects and tasked with providing a POC/LBGTQ/etc lens to something that is already struggling under the weight of its own emptiness. So you get half baked stories, half baked characters, no themes, etc but hey...we've got cool scenes with black people, which can be used in the advertising package for the streaming app! Shout outs to my parents who signed up for Disney+ to see Star Wars Acolyte only to then learn it has already been cancelled lol.

I love reading, I love films, and I enjoy some television shows. I've never read or watched anything that made me think "this character is white, I can't relate because I'm black." As a kid, I related to The Breakfast Club because I knew what it felt like to be mistreated, or to mistreat others, or to pretend to be brave, or to actually be brave. I saw myself on screen. In other cases, I saw or read about characters who were nothing like me, and that fascinated me as well. Villains who were nothing like me, themes I was unfamiliar with, settings I couldn't truly grasp...yet they still captured my attention and emotion. Because that's what art is supposed to fucking do lol. If your attention to art hinges entirely on whether it shows you what you want or who you are, you're just a rube. And sadly we have way too many rubes dictating where culture goes, what art does, etc.