The Core of Togetherness, and Me

Recently a certain someone giggled when I told her that the reason I dreamed of studying film was because of the Lord of the Rings special features. Yup, in high school my sister and I would watch "Cameras in Middle Earth" over and over, and not just for the fun of watching Legolas swing up onto that Oliphaunt.  I loved learning how tricky camera angles and painstaking animation work transformed Tolkien's words on the screen. So in giggling, she reminded me, rightfully so, that I am a (film) nerd. Somehow, though, over the past few years, I have misplaced that excitement, and that makes me nervous.

In HBO's Togetherness, Brett has also misplaced his. A father of two young kids and a saccharine but somewhat distant husband, Brett finds his life somewhat lackluster. He's a sound editor for the movies, and watching his friend Alex and sister-in-law Tina struggle financially has lulled him into inertia. In the first season, a memorable scene features him throwing a bit of a tantrum during a long film editing session because he's hungry (but really because the director doesn't like his attempt at some original sound-mixing). As Alex's career takes off in the second season, and after a brief confession of infidelity by Brett's wife blindsides him, Brett spins out in desperation; to cope with the news he follows Alex on a convalescent pilgrimage to their hometown of Detroit. There, they fall into the typical regression into boyhood, but it's fruitful thanks to a dug-up time capsule that contains a letter from teenage Brett and Alex to their adult selves. In it, they beg their future selves not to "be lulled into a mediocrity like everyone else and to remember our vow to stay true to the spirit of life." It's a majestic scene that contends with something so essential; the worry that in adulthood, we fork ourselves over to our numbing responsibilities.

Regressing means thrift store suits

Despite its naivete, the core of their adolescent wish resonates with me--someone who's seen their interests morph over time. Five years ago, film and culture dictated my passionate disposition and geographic location, but now I find myself less enthusiastic about those things -- so is the question that the core of me is muted, or has it merely changed? On the one hand, I'm nostalgic for the days I thought I knew what I loved. On the other, I think maybe I should accept that interests evolve but don't have to segment into disconnected pieces. Maybe my desire for pop culture informs my job in social media, which informs certain social justice leanings.

More recently, though, I think I've been conflating complacency with fear, and that's where it gets perilous. As a fascist presidential candidate gets more and more amplified thanks to our 24/7 news cycle, I wonder if I'm being paranoid, thinking that being complacent means I'm part of the problem, as a propagator and consumer of mass media. Am I a bystander of this terrifying political climate, or are my media habits actually doing some harm? Furthermore, have I lost all perspective on my core by being so exposed to media, something I've always been interested in?

Maybe it's a matter of rewatching Mr. Robot to assuage my guilty conscience.

Mr. Robot and my guilty conscience

Permit me to explode for a moment about Mr. Robot, USA's remarkable summer series about unreliable narrator Elliot (Rami Malek) and his hacker involvement in taking down corporations.

This show is un-effing-believable. And not just because we have a hard time believing Elliot. It's visually stunning, morally argumentative, powerfully written and narratively captivating. Think Fight Club and American Psycho and A Clockwork Orange for 2015, in a 10-episode serialized form.

What I love most about this show is Elliot's unabashed, paranoid take-down of capitalism, corporate America and the hyper-connectivity of our world. There are several standout characters, including Tyrell with his Swedish chill (the excellent Martin Wallström), and Mr. Robot himself, but Elliot is the most compelling (and confusing). As a skilled hacker whose delusions fuel his drive both to destroy and also unite, Elliot's world is scattered and disjointed yet webbed like a computer security network, bits and pieces whirring together. He's an angry young man who hates greed and people and in his extreme loneliness he may or may not have the means to destroy both these things. I won't spoil it, but the question of what's real nowadays, for Elliot and hence the viewer, is ever wavering after the explosive finale.

This show unhinged me a bit this week. His stance on social media (as well as consumerism, naiveté and a host of other social maladies) is that it's an infectious disease--super spreadable and toxic. Complacency through social media leads to laziness which leads to helplessness and mental illness. It's a strong viewpoint to be fair, but it left me nevertheless extremely conflicted about how networked my life is, personally and professionally.

Here's the thing about Mr. Robot. I watched it relentlessly, captivated, glued to the TV while trying to avoid spoilers on Twitter. But as soon as a huge plot point or character reveal happened (ummmm BD Wong as the White Rose?? Wut that was amazing!) I wanted to tweet my heart out with others watching. Thus employing what Elliot denounces. Thus buying into the system he crusades against. Sam Esmail, the creator of the show, seems to be using Mr. Robot as a platform for his brutalist perspective on the world, yet he nevertheless has a platform entirely supported by advertising to get his message across (ie, basic cable broadcasting). Such a morally complicated narrative would be a no-brainer fit somewhere like HBO or Showtime, whose subscribers dictate the kind of stories told on the channel, not like USA.  Which is why this show fascinates me - it actively calls out the evils of advertising/corporations/the 1% even though those things are its foundation. That this particular show exists on basic cable makes me think of Brutalist architect Le Corbusier's Pilotis pillars (PS do he and Sam Esmail share a philosophical brain?), those concrete columns that hold up stories upon stories of concrete.  If those pillars crumble, so does the whole structure, but they are deceptively, relentless strong. So is capitalism. So is advertising. So is Mr. Robot.

 Pilotis : brutalism :: advertising : Mr. Robot

I can't wait for the next season.

The UnReal-ity of the 'Bachelor' Universe

It's been a hot minute, I know. Working in TV and social media makes it harder to dedicate your free time to TV and social media. Who knew?

Nevertheless, I am currently swept up in the faraway land known as the Bachelor/ette/inParadise franchise. There is something very interesting happening in this world, which I've written about before, but you might not know it unless you are an avid fan able to parse out which tropes and codes are being disrupted in the Bachelor-verse this summer. These disruptions fall under two categories; one within the series The Bachelorette, the other outside it, namely the seriously compelling Lifetime (what, did I say those words together?) show UnReal. 

Let's start with how Kaitlyn Bristowe, the most recent Bachelorette to be whisked away by the glamor of 'dating' 25 men on TV, purposely or purposelessly spun the show on its head. See, Kaitlyn seems to behave like a woman of 2015, meaning she has a sex drive that leads to certain events. A few weeks into the courtship, when there are still ~8 men left in the game, she sleeps with one of the contestants. Normally in this show, sex happens under verrrryyy controlled circumstances and locations that are actually called 'fantasy suites,' which serial viewers of the franchise will tell you only pop out when there are 3 guys left. Usually these 'overnight dates' happen on a tropical island, complete with pillows and candles and maybe some palm trees rustling in the wind. Everyone knows sex goes on, but it is never talked about, because the show seems to pander to what it believes to be Middle American values (for its Midwestern mom demographic, maybe). This season, Kaitlyn sleeps with Nick in Dublin, in a hotel room. It's so pedestrian in comparison, but so much more real, because the next morning the crew catches her on camera having a heart-to-heart with one of the producers on her balcony, reciting all those things we millenial women sometimes recite to ourselves and to friends after sleeping with someone too early. She doesn't regret it, but now she has to figure out how to break the news to the others. Furthermore, she had already told another contestant in private (Shawn, who would end up with her heart), that he was the one.

How did the production team approach this behavior? They sort of embraced it and altered the format of the show. Yes, they seem to have scrapped the other exotic locations in favor of staying in Dublin with a shorter schedule (could this have been a weird punishment? Nah, since producers will do whatever they can for ratings), but they actually gave Kaitlyn the go-ahead to have overnights with four men, not three. They also exposed all the slut-shaming tweets aimed at Kaitlyn in a reunion special (and my feminist heart whined as I heard this vitriol) in order to incite and maybe defend their now-controversial commentary on sex. Then Kaitlyn only met two families instead of 3, which was probably a good call on the producers' part when they must have known pretty concretely that Kaitlyn only really cared about those two guys. It may have been a misstep on the production's part to bring the 'loser' all the way to a proposal, but again, ratings rule.

 "raise your hand if you have ever felt personally victimized by Regina George Twitter trolls"

Why is this important? Finally, after a bajillion seasons of this show perpetuated archaic values, romantic inventions, and hegemonic gender roles, we're finally seeing the cracks in that rigidity. I wouldn't go so far as to say that we're getting a positive representation of healthy relationships, but Kaitlyn has ushered in a frankness about sexuality that is welcome on a show that has, for better or worse, dictated some standards around courtship and romance in pop culture. That this franchise is also responsible for Bachelor in Paradise is interesting because the otherwise proper values steeped in the Bachelor/ette are nowhere to be found in "Paradise," where sex, backstabbing, and manipulation are called "love" to hide the jealousy and competition that draws us in like any good trashy tv.

Then there's UnReal. A scripted series that draws quite tightly from the Bachelor universe (it's basically a fictional behind-the-scenes look at the Bachelor), it tells the story of the backstabbing, manipulative producers responsible for this good trashy tv. What's great about UnReal isn't so much the scandals and cat-fights the producers encourage, but that these producers are women living in the feminist/post-feminist media landscape, grappling with their conflicting desires: power and morality, danger and safety, love and lust. For example, the female showrunner Quinn is a ruthless yet intuitive boss gunning for her own franchise, and she wants to take her best associate producer, Rachel, with her, despite Rachel's paranoia that this world is drawing her irreversibly farther away from escaping the manipulations and destruction she happens to be good at.

 Quinn certainly isn't nice, but she knows people, and she knows what makes good TV.

Honestly, I sometimes feel like Rachel. It is difficult to work in media without internalizing a general feeling that the internet brings out the worst in people. Being addicted to social media, like many in my generation, has made me less patient, less able to be in the moment, less empathetic, and less able to think deeply about issues larger than 140 characters. Yet when I see complex stories on TV about complex women, I feel like at least I have a voice, because stories like mine are starting to be told in mass media. I'm trying to escape it all, but I end up sucking myself back in. Maybe it's a vicious cycle, condemning the hand that feeds me because media also tells the stories I care about, but the fact that dating shows actually resonate on my feminist scale gives me hope.