America has been spoiled by a lifetime of happy endings. We hate tragedies and rewrite them so that audiences can leave on an uplifting note. We are obsessed with Hail Marys and last moment redemptions and success in impossible odds and Deus Ex Machina. It's how our tales end.
-
-
We love tales in which a team that has not prepared or trained overcomes a team who put in the work and suffering. And we expect and want them to get that win because they belatedly recognized the value of preparation and they're "plucky" We love anti-heroes.
Show this thread -
And all this plays out in how we leverage American Exceptionalism. We are immune to failure because we are "young, scrappy and hungry" What befalls other countries can't happen to us because this is OUR MOVIE and we are the protagonists.
Show this thread -
We don't believe we have to prepare for disasters because we are the stars of the show and we are guaranteed to be in the show next season. We don't have to consider what failure looks like because the hero of the story can't fail. We think planning for failure is absurd.
Show this thread -
We see the work of considering failure to be as ridiculous as asking if the star of the series is actually going to be killed in Episode 5. There is no real tension because despite feeling a flash of anxiety for the hero and whatever pain they're enduring, they'll be FINE.
Show this thread -
The Wizard will show up with an army when things look darkest The agent will appear and shoot the killer before he pulls his trigger The conspiracy will unravel before the public suffers devastation They'll find the vaccine before the disease spreads in red across the map
Show this thread -
The poetic vigilante will kill all the bad faith actors and blow up the symbol of government corruption. The school teacher will defuse the bomb with help from an expert over the phone with 2 seconds remaining. The greedy corporate tool will realize the value of community.
Show this thread -
We demand these tropes. We identify with these tropes. We have deluded ourselves. We believe they apply to us. We believe that whether we act sensibly or not, it'll work out SOMEHOW. Because America! And we will defend that belief to the death. Literally.
Show this thread
End of conversation
New conversation -
-
-
Is this why we learn about the Civil War in school but not about Reconstruction? (Or at least, I didn't learn about Reconstruction. We basically skipped from the Civil War to WWI.)
-
My classes basically glossed over cultural history from 1870-1943 with brief stop offs to talk about “the jungle” and like 15 seconds to tell us “uh, ww1 happened and ppl grew victory gardens” then it was off to spend 2 fucking months on “the crucible”
End of conversation
New conversation -
-
-
I feel like that's mostly the inclination but the really cultural ascendant, peak level acclaim media products go against that. Stuff that's morally complex is hard to write, perform and get the audience to buy into. I think that's what elevated The Wire above a cop drama
-
or Black Panther above superhero movie (sure T'Challa wins in the end but Killmonger never repents and end up affecting change as Wakanda ends it's isolation)
- Show replies
New conversation -
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.