You know how like Ayn Rand became the philosophical defender of
Capitalism, trying to confer dignity onto what was seen in many
other philosophies as soulless greed, at best a necessary evil?
Well, the author of this book
does the same thing but for Pop Culture rather than capitalism.
Then again defending pop culture, like the Marvel Cinemantic
Universe, is in a way defending Capitalism both from the left
and the reactionary right.
After all if you asked the average reactionary about what he
thought of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, he would say that it
is "bug man" consumerism for the mass man borne of mass
culture who heart can only "consume product, and get excited for
next product" mindlessly.
The author of this book does a great job at going over the
influences and thought put into the MCU revealing it not to be
totally mindless after all.
As with Ayn Rand, in the end I can't say that I agree with him
but as with Rand, I think this was a noble ennobling attempt,
and I can never hate someone who has done their research and put
in the work, as this author clearly has.
The book tries to extract an answer, a reconciliation, to the
politically divided world we live in by interpreting the text as
a humanist work defending liberal democracy - with different
heroes (and their character arcs) in the MCU representing
archetypes of groups, for instance Iron Man would be
representing private industry, Nick Fury the governing civil
service, and Thor the white majority in the US which is slowly
losing power and in decline.
Fundamentally it is a message that we can work it out if we
work together as one people complementing each others flaws like
a happy family of a nation, like the archetypes of society
assembling together to defeat yet another foe to western liberal
democracy, rather than a bunch of classes and groups attempting
to assert dominance over each other. But we see how all that
ended up in the real world, as opposed to fantasy, in
Afghanistan.
It is not an altogether disagreeable message but honestly if
you asked me the best we can hope for at this point is try to
keep out of each others way because we are too different to be
with each other and the balkanisation of western societies into
its constituent classes may as well not be a violent one.
I confess that I haven't watched most of the films discussed
here but the author's retelling of the stories is probably more
interesting than the movies themselves, and it was certainly
enough for me, a non-marvel fan, to understand everything that
was said.
As I have said a few times now, this was a noble attempt to
foster some kind of confidence in the current world order
dominated by decadent, weakening, ageing, divided, pitiable,
dying, flailing, sick nations of Europe (yes, America is a
Europeanised country though it's turning into a third world
country), I cannot fault it as an attempt but was it successful?
Not yet, but it is a start so I am very curious how this
author's ideas will develop in the future.
Given that I started with the Objectivists, let me end with
what Leonard Peikoff said; "philosophy is the motor of history."
It has the power to "determine the history of nations," and so
let me commend this author on taking seriously what most do not
consider to be serious art from an age that most do not consider
serious let alone able to give birth to anything worth
protecting.
Amazon Rating: 5/5
By Otaking, or The Good Student