As I take a step back and look critically at what I find most entertaining it's somewhat disconcerting to say that my favorite films and television shows are based in violence. Those most notable of those being the shows Dexter, Homeland, and Breaking Bad. All three shows revolve around acts or professions that call for great bloodshed and you'll hardly find an episode that does not exemplify these traits. So, what is America's obsession with seeing blood, torture, drug-use, and war crimes. The Saw series has been one of the most lucrative in Hollywood. The very nature of the films is just pure torture, to watch awful people do to other people things that we could never do, or feel we would never be justified doing. I feel it's a matter of wanting what we can't have. It's a phenomenon that we experience in many aspects of our lives beyond the films we watch. We want the spouse that's already taken, to be the rockstar we could never be, or simply to commit and act that is considered entirely socially deviant. The desire is overwhelming. Do these shows satisfy just that need. Dexter is a serial killer in every aspect of the term, yet at the end of the episode he is the one you're rooting for. The fact that he has a family only makes you want him to win more, as a lies to them and all his friends and fellow cast members. It is not my belief that it is shows like this that promote this action, but in fact deter it. Allowing such shows to be aired and glorified they satisfy that need in us to break social conformity and do something that we know would be totally socially unacceptable. When the fantasy can be converted to a television screen not only is the violence and injustice broadcast, not only is there room to show the senseless acts of violence, but also that which makes it so wrong and so conflicting. Viewing the darkness makes it that less appealing, the paranoia, the guilt, and inhumanity and glaringly obvious and rooting for a character such as Dexter as almost just as much rooting for him to give up his murderous ways.
Wednesday, May 8, 2013
Violent Media
As I take a step back and look critically at what I find most entertaining it's somewhat disconcerting to say that my favorite films and television shows are based in violence. Those most notable of those being the shows Dexter, Homeland, and Breaking Bad. All three shows revolve around acts or professions that call for great bloodshed and you'll hardly find an episode that does not exemplify these traits. So, what is America's obsession with seeing blood, torture, drug-use, and war crimes. The Saw series has been one of the most lucrative in Hollywood. The very nature of the films is just pure torture, to watch awful people do to other people things that we could never do, or feel we would never be justified doing. I feel it's a matter of wanting what we can't have. It's a phenomenon that we experience in many aspects of our lives beyond the films we watch. We want the spouse that's already taken, to be the rockstar we could never be, or simply to commit and act that is considered entirely socially deviant. The desire is overwhelming. Do these shows satisfy just that need. Dexter is a serial killer in every aspect of the term, yet at the end of the episode he is the one you're rooting for. The fact that he has a family only makes you want him to win more, as a lies to them and all his friends and fellow cast members. It is not my belief that it is shows like this that promote this action, but in fact deter it. Allowing such shows to be aired and glorified they satisfy that need in us to break social conformity and do something that we know would be totally socially unacceptable. When the fantasy can be converted to a television screen not only is the violence and injustice broadcast, not only is there room to show the senseless acts of violence, but also that which makes it so wrong and so conflicting. Viewing the darkness makes it that less appealing, the paranoia, the guilt, and inhumanity and glaringly obvious and rooting for a character such as Dexter as almost just as much rooting for him to give up his murderous ways.
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