Via: Tuned In
Maybe it was when I had to pause a screener for an upcoming new TV show to answer the doorbell recently, and noticed that the screen was paused on the image of a man with a broken bottle jammed in his mouth. (I won’t name the series, not that the scene is a spoiler. It’s just the kind of thing that apparently happens on this show.) Maybe it was when I watched the pilot for another new series in which a serial killer mentioned his elaborate ritual for detaching a certain bodily organ. Maybe it was in a late episode of Sons of Anarchy, in which a character (played by creator Kurt Sutter) intentionally bit off his own tongue and spat it out. Maybe it was during The Walking Dead this season, when Michonne jammed a shard of glass into the eye of The Governor–a brief change-up of human injury amid the scenes of the living slamming implements into zombie heads with wet thunks, as if they were jelly-filled pumpkins. Probably it was a more cumulative thing. But at some point I found myself thinking, Man, hasn’t the violence on these shows–good, or at least ambitious, TV dramas–gotten, er, intense? And baroque? And, maybe, verging on self-parody? All of which is to say: as someone who consumes a lot of pop culture for a living, I think there are plenty of good reasons to be critical of the violence in it: its ubiquity, its extremity and its use as a dramatic crutch. Many of the greatest dramas I’ve loved and admired most in the last decade have been violent, to intelligent, even artistic purpose. But a lot of not-so-greatest dramas lean on blood and gore too. There’s a monotone to a certain section of our culture right now, and that tone is: AUUUUUUUGGGH! That’s worth looking at; it’s worth questioning. After the Newtown shootings, however, it looks like we are again going to look at violence in the wrong way and for the wrong reasons–simplistically, reactively and temporarily. On MSNBC’s
Read full story at: Tuned In
Posted: December 20th, 2012
Comments
No comments, be the first to add one below!
You must login to post a comment!