Nerd Culture and American Culture

In ."The Revenge of the Nerds", Gary Hoppenstand argues that shows like The Big Bang Theory prove that nerd culture has become mainstream. The popularity of that program is credited as showing that nerdiness is no longer something of which one should be ashamed.

While I agree with Hoppenstand's result, I do not agree with his most explored example. The Big Bang Theory may be hugely popular, but it's success may be in spite of nerd culture's mainstream appeal, rather than because of it. It is true, as the author explains, that comic books and reading are interests that receive far less chastising from peers than ever before, but this is, perhaps, not because we are willing to watch nerds on TV, but because we are willing to consume the same media as them.

The top grossing film franchise of all time is Harry Potter, #2 is the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Nerdy films make money, and they have been continuously doing so since X-Men came out in 2000. The money train on nerd films shows no signs of stopping, with releases announced into 2020.

Does The Big Bang Theory portray nerds the way they want to be portrayed? In a world where nerd culture is mainstream enough for the Marvel Cinematic Universe to be as successful as it is, it seems counterfactual to portray nerds as socially inept, as the show does. While there are people in the world who fit the nerd archetype that are socially awkward, not all nerds are poorly adjusted, and, it has turned out that the ones that are poorly adjusted have tended to have issues beyond an obsession with the culture.

Do people watch Big Bang Theory to empathize with the nerds, or to laugh at them? The characters aren't role models socially, though their academic careers are stereotypically impressive, so one might look to the latter. Then what are we laughing at? The characters' awkward social graces hint at some sort of psychological disorder, such as autism or Asperger's. Is that really funny?

Regardless of whether he gave a good example, Hoppenstand's point about nerds being cool stands as true, though with more credit to Hugh Jackman than Jim Parsons.

Film Bodies: Gratuitous Emotion in Melodrama.

In "Film Bodies: Gender, Genre, and Excess", Linda Williams describes her theory of body genres, which are those film genres designed to use excess to create intense emotional reactions in the viewer. The genres in particular that she pinpoints in her work are pornography, horror, and melodrama. In my current work, I am particularly concerned with how these elements impact melodrama, rather than horror or porn.

I feel the need to clarify that Linda Williams is a professor of film studies at University of California, Berkeley. I clarify this because there is another Linda Williams on the administration at Berkeley, and a Linda Ruth Williams doing film studies in the UK. There is a lot of room for confusion in this area if a reader of this blog wished to go about their own research on the topic.

Regardless, Williams writes a compelling argument for the value of melodrama, but examines melodrama in a way that is perhaps far too narrow. She states that melodrama is defined by "lapses in realism, excesses of spectacle, and displays of primal, even infantile emotions, and by narratives that seem circular and repetitive." This is an adequate measure of the sensationalism of melodrama, but she goes on to say that, for the purpose of her thesis, she will look only at those melodramas that concern feminist critics, what she calls "weepies", or what we may characterize as the elements of a Lifetime Original Movie, sad movies made for women stuck in traditional gender roles. She rejects a greater definition of melodrama because it could be argued that all three body genres, pornography, horror, and melodrama, are all really types of melodrama. This misses, then, a greater genre of melodrama not directed at women under patriarchy, the type of movie that uses overly intense sensational emotions without losing it's ability to appeal to a wide audience. The prototypical melodrama play, Under The Gas Light, would struggle to stay in the genre under the feminist critical definition.

A broader definition of melodrama brings in things like crime dramas and dark comedies, but doesn't break Williams's thesis that body genres are designed to excite us through excess. Good Will Hunting, for example, could be argued as a melodrama under a broad definition. The portrayal of weeping that qualifies the film as a "spectacle of a body caught in the grip of intense sensation or emotion", does occur in the female form via Minnie Driver's character, but she is anything but a woman in a traditional gender role, and the more memorable weeping comes from Robin Williams and Matt Damon.

Another element of body genres that Williams looks at is ecstasy, expressed in melodrama as "overppowering sadness" In my film, this will be seen not in tears, as Williams's weepies would show it, but in the alcoholism of Danny Jefferson, who drinks when others might cry. Williams argues that, in all the body genres, women are the "embodiment of pleasure, fear, and pain". In my film, the main character's foil, Beth, is the expression of his pain in the sense that the audience will ask why he is depressed, then her actions will in turn give explanation.

Fun Home and Identification

In the first 2 chapters of Fun Home, Bechdel illustrates perfectly the ideas of identifcation described in Understanding Comics.

In words and images, Bechdel describes her father obsessively, pouring over every detail of the man. Herself, however, she does not describe. She remains mostly a blank slate, almost cartoon like in her simplicity, with somewhat androgynous features.

In Understanding Comics, McCloud says that "through traditional realism, the comics artist can portray the world without -- and through the cartoon, the world within."

Fun Home, Page 19

In the panel above, we see this principle in action. The father is detailed, with wrinkles and chest hair and zig-zag eyebrows. The child is prototypical- a round head with an androgynous hair cut and wide eyes. Anyone could be that child. So who do we identify with? The child, because the features of the child are far more simplified and therefore relatable. Imagine if the child had freckles, would we relate the same? Or if the book had color art, hair color, and skin color could be elements that change the way we are able to relate to the child. The father, with his visible body hair and wrinkles alienates us to a degree. We cannot project our own emotions onto a person who is so far from who we are or ever were, but we were all wide-eyed children at some point, and the child is sympathetic because of her simplicity. 

But this extends into the written word of Fun Home. Bechdel describes her father in vivid detail, both his fashion and his perfectionism, and something that borders on Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Psychologist Alan Rappoport says that narcissistic parents "may also demand certain behavior from their children because they see the children as extensions of themselves". While in Fun Home, Bechdel says "Dad considered us extensions of his own body, like precision robot arms.". These details about her father lend to us identifying more with her, for some because we cannot imagine a father like that, and for some because it hits our own home experience in a certain way, but we grow to empathize with the idea of a selfish father for one reason or another, and it ties us to this character, either out of pity or out of solidarity. 

Statement Of Intent: 4 Inches Of Danny Jefferson

For my Capstone project, I will be making my longest, most ambitious film to date: Four Inches of Danny Jefferson. I have chosen Jason McKahan as my Capstone director. I'll be moving on to graduate school after Shepherd, and this might be my last chance for a while to make a film. I've had this screenplay drafted since July of 2013, and it's received quite a bit of polish as a result of continuous drafting.

The movie will tell the story of Danny Jefferson, a nerdy college dropout (after only one semester) with a taste for collecting toys and drinking whiskey. When Danny's father dies suddenly, he is convinced to return to his hometown and attend the funeral, much to the ire of his stepmother, Beth, that's only three years his senior. When he gets home, old feelings for his high school sweet heart, Jenny, come back, complicated by her revelation that she is pregnant with his child. These factors come together to a point that Danny is forced to grow up.

I plan to also integrate some fantastical elements, such as Beth, the evil stepmother, turning into an 8-bit dragon during a wedding reception. Animation for this sequence would be a simple After Effects job with image manipulation and particle effects.

Rough idea of the 8-bit Dragon, wings would flap in final version.

So far as tools, I'm looking at editing in Premiere, doing titles and the aforementioned dragon scene in After Effects, and composing a soundtrack in LMMS's synthesizer, allowing for a mix of realistic synthesized drums and bass guitars with synthesizers that emulate the sound of Game Boy to fit with the overall nerd-culture feel of the film.

A lot of nerd-culture films and TV shows are either overly referential (Scott Pilgrim) or somewhat reductive (The Big Bang Theory). I want to make a film that integrates nerd-culture in a way that acknowledges the mainstreaming of nerd culture. Research into the mainstreaming of nerd culture would be necessary. I will also be researching the Mono-myth, as I hope to explore how a melodrama can fit into or not fit into the criteria of Hero With A Thousand Faces, despite not being a mythology per se.

A theme of the film is the idea of belonging. Danny proposes to Jenny with an action figure because he attributes a sentiment of belonging to the toy that he wants to attribute to his new family. The use of this theme in other films would be worth looking into.

Of course, to link this work to later research I have planned for graduate school, I'd like to explore Linda Williams's work in the idea of "body genres". Here, the "body genre" is melodrama, as opposed to horror or pornography. Although, Jenny's employment as stripper, and Beth's transformation into a dragon could allow for some degree of crossover, even if the dragon looks cartoonish.

Despite a 35 page screenplay at the current draft, I think that, because I have most of the cast already picked out and committed, I can begin shooting almost immediately, and burn through most of the script in a minimal amount of time. Editing will be very straightforward, and I predict that the soundtrack can probably be composed in a day or two. This gives me plenty of time to do research on the topics outlined above. I am confident in my ability to make this project work well and be well thought out.

Framing In A Graphic Novel: Hellboy

Hellboy: The Third Wish 1

This page caught my eye for it's highly non-linear organization within very clean, straight forward boxes.

These panels are all very straightforward in shape. The rectangular feel holds the action in the pages. The exception is that other pages in the book have dialogue bubbles leaving the panels to rest centered on the borders. In this, we see that the words are the only things not held neatly.

So far as the narrative, these panels don't really give us a sense of order. We see a sequence of events unfold, but are somewhat oblivious to the order of the events.

For the principle of closure, I'd actually like more panels to make more sense of what's happening. Because of a lack of panels going one way or another, I cannot tell if the characters are sinking or floating.

The one really interesting thing in these pages is the di-chromatic frame within a frame. It's there probably because the frame itself is too dark to notice the action without it, but it also manages to catch one's eye before the fish in the other frames do, making the setting somewhat ambiguous at first glance.