From Newsgroup: rec.arts.tv
Verily, in article <10qpl4l$ae4o$
2@dont-email.me>, did
weberm@polaris.net deliver unto us this message:
Modern movies and TV shows feel? off.
Why does everything sound the same? Why can?t serious moments stay
serious? Why does every story seem afraid of heroes?
In this video, I break down 7 signs of ?Millennial Writing? ? a
storytelling style defined by irony as a default, therapy language
replacing moral clarity, identity as a shortcut to character, and
subversion without reconstruction.
[snip]
https://youtu.be/NGSkq9WeNcI?si=NaLax9eSWKjVAmGP
This is a good essay. I'm sure he's right about the underlying sin being
a fear of taking anything seriously, thus risking embarrassment.
I would add a few points. For instance, during Sin #4, he says that
writers make everyone sound like a 21st-century Californian because
they're lazy. I think it's because they're patronizing. They (not all,
but they collectively) have decided that we're such stupid, limited
animals that we can't relate to anyone who doesn't look and sound like
us.
Someone in the comments made a good point about the Millennial Character
Arc, in which the character doesn't change in any way but everyone else realises that the character was good/right all along. That's a bigger
deal than it sounds, and it already sounds like a fairly big deal. I'm reminded of Ted from How I Met Your Mother, who refused to change and preferred to believe all those women weren't The One.
In the MCA, as opposed to traditional arcs, everyone other than the protagonist has to change. The day is saved when the gang, or one
special person, realizes that the protagonist was always virtuous and
right, and the protagonist can't control that. If the protagonist is
always right and always perfect, the protagonist is no longer the
pivotal factor. The real hero is whoever decided that [insert
protagonist's type of victim here] wasn't bad after all -- that's the
person who had to reexamine himself and face a flaw and alter his own self-narrative for the greater good.
Ever hear of a frontkick? It's an obscure trope which flips the sidekick
idea around, for situations where the so-called sidekick is getting it
done more than the putative hero. For instance, some say that Harry
Potter is Hermione's frontkick because she does so much of the actual
work.
The MCA protagonist is not a hero but a frontkick. Someone else does the
hard part, and the protagonist is treated as the hero anyway. Our new
heroes don't create change. They demand others change.
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