Almost everyone reading this grew up under a largely monolithic American pop culture. Whether it’s Baby Boomers’ love of the Beatles or the multigenerational Star Wars fandom that originated with Gen X, anyone who came of age in the past several decades could easily navigate the pop landscape by several universally accessible landmarks.
All cultural institutions have now been seized by fanatics who hate the heritage American people from whom pop culture sprang. Instead of curating the touchstones they’ve usurped, the cultists are using them to mercilessly pelt their audience.
Members of the various fandoms long refused to acknowledge the enmity hurled at them by their favorite brands’ new owners. A look at the entertainment scene reveals encouraging signs that the more self-respecting Pop Cultists are wising up. Author David V. Stewart reports on the uproar over Wizards of the Coast’s latest middle finger to its customers.
Meanwhile, on the international stage, America’s cultural hegemony teeters on the brink of collapse. The global market once relied on Hollywood for entertainment. That’s becoming less and less the case, particularly in China. Lots of foreign countries now boast film industries to rival America’s, and what’s more, many of them are run by nationalist regimes that don’t appreciate Hollywood’s Death Cult agitprop. As a result, Chinese movies made for Chinese audiences are beating Hollywood imports at the Chinese box office.
One consequence of replacing the original American population has been the fracturing of American-imposed pop culture. The Cultists who invade ordinary people’s hobbies are quick to tell the original enthusiasts they’re no longer welcome, and the OGs are increasingly taking their business elsewhere.
Take comic books for example. People forget that reading comics stopped being a mainstream pastime thirty years ago. If not for Hollywood’s bloated cape flicks, the comics industry would’ve been relegated to a tiny niche market years ago. Now, even Marvel’s bombastic tentpoles are losing their luster.
What the future of entertainment probably holds is a post-Pop Cult age wherein no one player enjoys worldwide market dominance. I recently joined best selling comics creator Jon Del Arroz to discuss these and other pop culture matters. Watch the show here:
Do your part to help hasten the Pop Cult’s demise. Stop giving money to people who hate you. Support creators who want to entertain you.
JDA’s disdain for Harry Pothead reminds me of an article from SCHOLASTIC NEWS. After JK Rowling published the last Harry Potter book, a bunch of children testifed to SCHOLASTIC that Harry Potter would inspire them to read other book series.
Their English teachers must have derailed them.
Yes, the old HP defense of “At least it encourages kids to read!” turned out to not quite be the truth. It just encouraged kids to be Potterheads, fanfic obsessives, and writers of their own YA garbage that destroyed an entire market. Turns out the legacy of the series is simply one of harm.
I’d be curious as to how much of that was caused by the movie adaptations coming so swiftly on the heels of the books.
A Catalan blogger noticed that JK’s narration style changed after the movies were released. The early Harry Potter books read like classic children’s stories, whereas the later books read like live narrations of what JK could see on a movie screen.
So even if the movies were responsible for the Potterheads, the books fed the literary platitudes of “Show; don’t tell.” They probably even influenced the narrations within the fanfics.
Without the pop cult to hold them up, Hollywood and its adjacent industries are held up only by momentum and drying investment. The sooner all of that gets swept away the sooner we can restore things to their proper place again.
I can’t say I ever in a million years expected things to work out this way. I don’t know what I thought would happen, but not this. Well, God does work in mysterious ways. This era is proof of that.
God allows evil that greater good may come of it. When all’s said and done, the post-Pop Cult world will be better off than a world where it never existed.
China has nuclear weapons and a space program. They’ve also had a rather robust film industry for quite sometime. They aren’t some 3rd world craphole in need Western enlightenment. Add to that the Chinese tendency to want decidedly Chinese things, and it’s not surprising that all the kowtowing to the CCP isn’t working.
None of that stops the American media types from spending truck loads of cash to find the magic key to open the Chinese door. They’ll eventually go broke doing this, but it will take a while. In the mean time, I expect some indies will find a way to produce content an actual American audience will want.
Chris,
So the neocon mentality has infiltrated Hollywood too. This insufferable obsession to cater to a foreign audience and ignore or denigrate the locals.
Yeah that’s a sustainable long term business plan.
I’m intrigued what’ll arise after Pop culture collapses
xavier
India and (surprisingly) Nigeria are other countries with vibrant local movie-making scenes. I’m actually quietly marking Nigeria as a possible great power of the future, presuming that they don’t implode due to internal issues, corruption, or Jihadism. They’ve got 180 million people, a vigorous faith, plenty of English speakers, and lots of potential. Of course, potential is just potential, so God only knows what the future will bring.
My sons were wanting to see Space Jam 2 this weekend. My wife and I explained about them removing Pepe Le Pew for being a touchy stalker but leaving in actual gang rapists.
I had also added to her earlier that Lebron James should not receive any of our dirty money since he hates us just for being us. She didn’t see the need to add that part for them.
What else did they do? Make Lola flat-chested to keep trans women from feeling self-conscious—and not because Internet critics complained about “bunny boobies?”
Even absent the political pandering of that movie, it’d still be a perfect Pop Cult movie. Instead of merely being a crossover with classic cartoon characters, it stuffs in every single property that the studio has access to just to say “hey, remember brand X?”
What I mean is that yeah throwing in Alex’s gang while taking out Pepe LePew for his supposed sins is hypocritical. But even if they left in Pepe, what value could there be in doing a crossover with A Clockwork Orange? Or Batman and Robin, Rick and Morty, Game of Thrones, IT, etc.?
The crossover idea probably came from some overly clever 20something idiot. I doubt any of tje clowns involved in this thing actually saw A Clockwork Orange.
Well done.