The Cumulative Effects of Violent Entertainment

Earlier this week, I joined a discussion on Tyrus Books publisher Ben LeRoy's blog about the repercussions of crime fiction. Ben conscientiously asks:

Even if all of the violent media consumed doesn't cause copycat acts of violence, what does it do to the hardwire of our brain as far as our perception of those around us, most notably the strangers on the “other side” goes?

Also taking the discussion to Twitter, Ben asks to what extent violent entertainment perpetuates real violence and contributes to a cycle whereby writers depict violence, cynicism, and other negativity in their efforts to depict our world accurately.

I replied on Twitter that—though I enjoy some violent fiction, TV shows, and movies—a lot out there doesn't appeal to me. I choose not to immerse myself in violent entertainment even knowing it's not real.

I'm not saying, "It's not a problem for me, so it's not a problem." I just think we should equip future generations to be discerning consumers of entertainment as well.

Ben Affleck is Batman?

I've just read Variety's report that Affleck has been cast as Batman opposite Henry Cavill's Superman in Zack Snyder's Man of Steel sequel. I'm in disbelief given Affleck's professed disappointment at having played my favorite superhero, Daredevil, and his resulting vow never to play a superhero again.

The report is probably true, though. I liked Ben well enough as Daredevil. I don't know that I'd believe him as a darker, broodier Batman, but his Batman may not be as dark as Bale's anyway. The key will be for the characters to balance each other. Since Cavill's Superman is darker, Affleck's Batman may be lighter. There's room for that without reentering Joel Schumacher territory.

Here's what I thought when news of the movie broke at San Diego Comic-Con.

Superman vs. Batman

One of the scoops at San Diego Comic-Con this year was that, in the sequel to Man of Steel, Superman would be pitted against Batman, bringing to mind their battle in The Dark Knight Returns.

There is already much speculation as to how the movie will be plotted. Zap2it.com Contributing Editor Billy Nilles calls the premise a bad idea, asserting that writer David Goyer and directer Zack Snyder have "irreparably altered Superman's philosophy".

While I also found Man of Steel's final battle clumsily contrived, the rationale behind the sequel may be as simple as profit. Thanks to Tim Burton, Bruce Timm, and Christopher Nolan, Batman is probably Warner Bros.' most lucrative property. Meanwhile, though Superman hasn't been as successful at the movies, he remains popular enough to have afforded TV's Smallville ten seasons. Regardless who plays Batman or how problematic the plot, people will go see it. The powers-that-be are risking very little.

If I Wrote a Superman Movie...

As pleased as I am with Man of Steel, Superman brawling with bad guys has always seemed crude to me. This has long been his m.o. in comics and cartoons. In Warner Bros. Animation's 2001 Justice League cartoon, Superman was deliberately powered down so he would need his super friends' help.

My Clark Kent/Superman would have traveled the world, gaining insight into every culture and himself. He would be aware of how powerful he was, of how much damage he were capable of, and would be firmly against aggression. His instinct, like a Jedi's, would be to defend, not to attack. He would not punch, but would slip, block, and use submission holds. Not adding to villains' violence, he would not cause as much collateral damage.

He would be a rescuer and would use his power to nullify villains' power such that, when Superman arrived, they might simply give up.

I know. It would probably never sell. But I'll keep dreaming.

More MAN OF STEEL

Crime author and friend Russel D. McLean weighs in on Man of Steel at Do Some Damage. I offered a spoilery comment.

MAN OF STEEL

My friend and fellow Superman fan John Ricotta and I watched Man of Steel tonight in IMAX 3D. Arriving forty-five minutes before the show, we sketched out how we would show both Superman's origins and his current ordeal, and the movie unfolded just as we wanted.

This is the first live-action movie to focus on Clark Kent's search for identity. Meanwhile, Lois Lane is first on the trail of a mysterious savior. The heart of any Superman story for me is Clark's relationship with Lois, and Amy Adams' Lois gets to know Clark before anyone else, even before Clark discovers Jor-El and puts on the jammies.

Clark, Lois, Zod, and Jor-El are all well served. I do agree with the criticism that there is too much destruction. Superman's handling of Zod in the end keeps to the post-Superman Returns grittier mission statement, but the dialogue telegraphs it, so it seem drawn out. Nevertheless, Warner Bros. now has a Superman on whom to build a new franchise. Godspeed.

STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS

In the J.J. Abrams-directed sequel to 2009's Star Trek, the bombing of a London archive puts Starfleet on high alert. A strategy meeting ends with a second attack by the fugitive John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch) that kills Christopher Pike (Bruce Greenwood) and several senior staff.

The top remaining commander orders Kirk, recently demoted to Pike's first officer, to pursue Harrison into Klingon space and kill him.

I had heard several negative reviews going in and thought the major plot twist had been leaked/publicized/spoiled years in advance. Added to my general pessimism for sequels, I was prepared to just tolerate this movie, but there was a lot more I didn't know, a lot of meat.

Into Darkness is most ingenuous in echoing the original Star Trek II but upending it. Some well-known lore was glossed over, making some twists feel abrupt, but nothing stopped me from enjoying. If another is made, I'm there.

Steeling Myself

As I await the June 14 release of Man of Steel, Variety reports its budget was $175 million, with an additional $150 million spent on marketing. Warner Bros. motion pictures group president Jeff Robinov has predicted it will be the studio's best performer ever, but I worry that its high price tag will put a crimp in profits. 2006's Superman Returns grossed $391 million, but cost $363 million after marketing.

I could see Man of Steel as a world-beater if this were 1978, when Richard Donner's Superman attracted fans of heroes who weren't getting movies. In 2013, with each superhero movie expected to outdo the last, I doubt Superman surpasses Marvel's The Avengers or Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy.

IRON MAN 3

After lunch at Bill's Bar and Burger on 9th Avenue at 13th Street, I took the subway up and ducked into the AMC Loews 34th Street 14 for a 2:00 P.M. show of Iron Man 3.

The original IRON MAN is the new standard in superhero movies. IRON MAN 2 is a movie I enjoyed on first viewing but have liked less each time since. IRON MAN 3 has highs and lows. It's better than 2, but surpassing 2 is not all that hard.

After the latest in a series of bombings by The Mandarin puts Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau) in a coma, Tony Stark vows personal revenge, going so far as to give The Mandarin his home address. Well spoiled by previews, The Mandarin levels Tony's house and leaves him for dead, forcing armor-less Tony to regroup off the grid.

The rebuilding aspect of the movie is very human and shows Robert Downey Jr. at his spontaneous best, but there are also many tangents taking away from the chance to deliver a deeper message. In addition to firing back at Tony, The Mandarin captures the U.S. President (If he's ever been seen or mentioned in the series before, I forget. The only way I could care was to ask, "What hero wouldn't save the President?"). Tony also suffers post-traumatic stress from being sucked into the wormhole at the end of THE AVENGERS, but his trauma isn't explored. It just seems to be there so Tony can bug out of the plot at random.

In some ways, IRON MAN 3 feels like a wrap-up to a trilogy, but it also feels like a James Bond movie, complete with the closing credit, "Tony Stark Will Return". I would have liked more decisiveness.

The Nerdpocalypse on the Veronica Mars Kickstarter

I've been a fan of The Nerdpocalypse site and podcasts since they interviewed Middleman creator Javier Grillo-Marxuach last year. Host Jay blogged yesterday about the Veronica Mars Kickstarter, and I commented this morning.

Kickstarter

Creator Rob Thomas reached a funding goal of $2 million toward a Veronica Mars movie in one day. As a fan of the show, I was glad to see it happen, but I'm sure there are other hurdles in the way.

I've backed two Kickstarter projects so far: Seth Harwood's CrimeWAV Books and Michael A. Arnzen's Fridge of the Damned, which both reached their goals. I think Kickstarter is a good way to reach out to fans and make them feel a part of projects, but I have no plans to use it to fund my own.

My experience publishing and promoting The Lineup didn't show enough interest to warrant a campaign. If I take your money in advance, I'm obligated to you; whereas if I see something through to fruition on my own, I will have done it my way, and you can buy my product or not. Whether you buy, my product is already out there.

On the other hand, I might use Kickstarter to offer small rewards related to a base product. The goal might be lower because it wouldn't include the cost to make the product itself, and it would show how large a fan base I had.

JACK REACHER Sequel Unlikely

A friend with whom I watched JACK REACHER, who enjoyed it as I did, sent me this word that a sequel is unlikely.

Though the movie has made a profit on its $60 million production budget, apparently Paramount's sales figure to greenlight a sequel is $250 million. I think that was too much to expect with holiday competition like THE HOBBIT and LES MISERABLES.

Don't Judge a Genre by Its Cover

This week's Shortmystery discussion of violence in books, movies, and video games has been thought-provoking and enlightening. More of my comments:

For me, the difference between movie and book violence is the former is fixed imagery determined by a director and presented as such to viewers; the latter is written by an author but must be interpreted and imagined by readers—every one of whom will imagine something slightly different. That's why there is more censorship of movies and TV than of books.

...[W]e as writers should be conscious of how our imagery affects readers. Ideally, we want them to feel certain ways at certain times all through our stories. That said, being overly concerned about how any one reader might react is detrimental to writing overall and does not prevent a delusional reader's misinterpretation.

Even if the worst happens—your story inspires someone to commit a crime—the ultimate responsibility for those actions is the reader's.

And today, fellow Shortmystery member Anita Page carried the discussion on to the Women of Mystery blog. There, I commented:

...It’s wrongheaded to blame violent books, movies, and video games on face value. One must look into the ultimate messages the writers are trying to send. Are these deep or shallow? Right or wrong? Would they give a sane person the wrong idea?

One of the series that hooked me on crime fiction was Robert B. Parker’s Spenser. Spenser and his friend Hawk are former boxers, capable of inflicting pain and forced to do so from time to time, but neither takes pleasure in it. Both have strategies to keep themselves in check. For one thing, Spenser makes a commitment to Susan Silverman, a psychologist who can help him with moral choices. Hawk, on the other hand, commits himself to no one, does not allow himself to feel much emotion of any kind. Parker shows that one is clearly the better path to contentment.

The Spenser series would undoubtedly teach a sane person not only how to keep violent impulses in check, but also how to develop morality and autonomy.

UPDATE: It's only fair I also examine the negative message sent by Spenser's continued association with Hawk and other killers.

JACK REACHER (2012)

Though I am a fan of Lee Child's Jack Reacher, I hadn't planned to see this movie in the theaters until my brother saw it—his third choice after Life of Pi and The Hobbit. He liked it and thought I would, too. I hadn't read One Shot, on which the movie is based, but I figured I'd wait so as not to spoil any twists.

Iraq war veteran James Barr stands accused of killing five seemingly random people with sniper fire. Barr insists the authorities get Jack Reacher. By the time Jack arrives, Barr has been beaten into a coma, making the movie more a mystery, which, as my brother predicted, was right up my alley. I also liked that the movie was made for an estimated $50 million, one-third the budget of blockbusters these days. As of last weekend, it had made $64.7 million at the box office.

Tom Cruise will never be 6'5", but he doesn't have to be: He's Tom Cruise (Maverick, Charlie Babbitt, Daniel Caffey, Lestat, Jerry Maguire...). His calm demeanor and gravitas as an actor play into his assured portrayal of Reacher. If he can keep up the nitty-gritty thriller feel, Cruise may have found the franchise role he can play well into his fifties.

Drawing the Line

Earlier this week, Harvey Levin of TMZ tweeted:

Do YOU think actors who are in favor of gun laws are hypocrites by using firearms in their films? Why/Why not?

— Harvey Levin(@HarveyLevinTMZ) January 3, 2013

Actors' roles don't have to line up with their real values. The measure of actors is their ability to play a range of characters across the moral spectrum. If actors support gun control with the same visibility on their personal time, audiences know where they stand.

When he played MacGyver, Richard Dean Anderson, like MacGyver, was a gun control advocate. Anderson went on to play the very-comfortable-with-guns Gen. Jack O'Neill on Stargate SG-1, but I believe the actor still supports gun control.

When we hear that killers watched violent movies, read violent books, or played violent video games, the knee-jerk reaction is to blame the material. But I watched violent movies and played violent video games growing up, and they soured me on mindless violence. I enjoy fiction and poetry about crime and have no desire to hurt real people. I find it cleverest when characters don't use violence to get what they want.

People inspired to real violence by fictitious violence cannot tell one from the other. Improving our relationships and ability to help them prevents violence more effectively than trying to control content.

Best of 2012 - Movies

I don't get to watch many movies in theaters, and you'll notice a theme in much of what I did watch, but here goes:

SKYFALL is at the top of my list for what it does to revitalize the Bond franchise after 2008's mediocre Quantum of Solace. Skyfall both explores new territory and calls back some classic themes and characters.

WRECK-IT RALPH didn't especially appeal to me in previews, but grew on me as it went on. Halfway through, I was completely invested in characters whose actions and outcomes weren't predetermined.

MARVEL'S THE AVENGERS lived up to years of hype, but watching it on video, its structure is more obvious, a set of action sequences devised to showcase each hero. I'm not sure the sequences are tied together that well. Still a fun ride.

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES was better than The Dark Knight, which I'm sure is enough of a controversial opinion. I liked that it gave Bruce Wayne an ending, a way out of being the Batman. I liked Anne Hathaway as Selena Kyle. The rest of the movie felt heavy, but it may boil down to the fact I'm not the biggest Batman fan.

WRECK-IT RALPH

My brother and I are Wreck-It Ralph's target audience, having spent many a childhood afternoon in mall arcades. We took a couple of hours off last week to watch a matinee.

Impressively, none of the main characters is stereotypical. After thirty years, Ralph (John C. Reilly) doesn't want to be a bad guy anymore, but Fix-It Felix Jr. (Jack McBrayer), Vanellope von Schweetz (Sarah Silverman), and Calhoun (Jane Lynch) also showed capacity to stretch beyond their "day jobs".

Wreck-It Ralph isn't perfectly paced, but I appreciated the characters and plot more as the movie went on, and by the end I was hanging on every word. Definitely worth your quarters.

SKYFALL

My brother and I saw Skyfall last week, and my review posted to Crimespree Magazine's blog today. Thanks as always to entertainment editor Jeremy Lynch.

The CW's Arrow

When I heard The CW was planning a grittier superhero show with Arrow, I approved, but concept is one thing, execution another. Developer Greg Berlanti's work on 2011's live-action Green Lantern was nothing outstanding, but I was a fan of Susanna Thompson, here playing Oliver Queen's mother, from NCIS, and of Paul Blackthorne, here playing Dinah Lance's father, from SyFy's The Dresden Files. I had also enjoyed producer Moira Kirkland's work on Castle.

Most important, I was a fan of Green Arrow from Justice League Unlimited and Smallville but had not read any Green Arrow comics. My friends at The Nerdpocalypse were quick to point out much of the pilot episode's cheesiness and how it seemed to deviate from the character's canon. For the first seven of its ten seasons, I criticized Smallville for similar departures. Later I realized Smallville was trying for, and deserved to have, its own take on Superman. This prepared me for the liberties taken with Green Arrow.

The producers say they're going for realism. They want a show as much about family dynamics as about heroics. It remains to be seen how realistic they can be, but with each episode, Arrow grows on me. I think it helps that I'm less invested in Green Arrow than I was in Superman. I can watch the show objectively and for entertainment value.

Reaching the Threshold

Yesterday at Hey, There's a Dead Guy in the Living Room, New Jersey mystery writer Jeff Cohen had enough of the Tom Cruise-as-Jack Reacher jokes and defended shorter actors' ability to deliver big performances.

While the size discrepancy struck me funny, I never doubted Cruise could fill the role; I just thought Reacher as played by Cruise would be similar to other loner heroes he's played.

My comment on Jeff's post concludes:

In the best scenario for moviegoers, Reacher becomes so associated with Tom that they can't imagine another actor playing him. I'm not sure it would be best for Reacher to become one of many loner heroes Tom Cruise has played. I liken it to Jason Statham's playing Richard Stark's master thief, Parker. If you weren't a Parker fan already, you might easily forget Statham's Parker among the many tough guys he's played.

The more we see actors, the better we get to know their nuances. Over time, we pick up on every one, and later performances are more the character becoming the actor than the actor becoming the character.