Lensherr
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- May 15, 2016
One of the most annoying prevalent trends in contemporary fiction (genre fiction in particular) for me is how often serious, emotional moments are undercut with a joke right as they reach their metaphorical crescendo.
To illustrate what I'm talking about, let me compare two scenes from two different superhero movies: Spider-Man 2 and Doctor Strange:
(For the latter clip, the part I'm talking about ends at the 2:49 mark)
Both scenes are supposed to be triumphant moments where the hero finally finds the resolve to suit up and fight the bad guy after relinquishing doubt in their abilities to do so. However, unlike the scene in Spider-Man 2, which follows through on the aforementioned emotional crescendo, the one in Doctor Strange kneecaps itself with a joke right when that's about to happen in an attempt to get a laugh out of an audience.
This is the cinematic equivalent of a literary technique known as bathos. As described by Wikipedia:
Now, like any literary technique, this can be used for good or ill. To illustrate an example of the former, let's use Robert Eggers' 2019 film The Lighthouse:
(EDIT: I was unable to find a version of this scene on YouTube that allowed playback on other sites, so I apologize for the inconvenience of not being able to watch it here)
In this scene, Willem Dafoe's character, Thomas Wake, goes on a tirade against Robert Pattinson's character, Ephriam Winslow, when the latter insults his cooking. It's an incredibly intense monologue, with Wake conjuring up an image of a mythical sea God emerging from the depths to strike Winslow down for his unkind comments. Yet the mood abruptly switches from serious to trivial at the end, with Winslow's quip deflating the tension that had been building. Why this technique works here is because the situation that had resulted in such an intense display of anger from Wake was ultimately rather trivial itself (or at least too trivial for someone to get that worked up over).
The reason why it doesn't work in Doctor Strange is because the situation, from a inter-diagetic perspective, is not so trivial. The fate of the universe is at stake and Strange has to rise to the occasion to defeat the great evil that threatens it. What the writers meant to signal, I believe, with a moment like this is that this is ultimately, from an extra-diagetic perspective, just a silly story about people in silly costumes battling each other with silly power, and that we, the audience, should not take this too seriously. However true this may be, it kills any semblance of sincerity that the story had going for it, as opposed to the scene in Spider-Man 2, which embraces sincerity despite the trappings of the material.
This is very common in entertainment today, and a lot of that can be contributed to the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The first Avengers movie was written and directed by Joss Whedon, whose writing style is best exemplified by the following quote:
As you can infer, Whedon makes plentiful use of bathos in his work. And due to the success of The Avengers, Marvel began attempting to copy his voice in their other films even when he left the franchise for good. Because of the success of the that franchise, other works have attempted to ape that particular style of writing, including the upcoming Dingeons & Dragons movie just to name one example:
So what's the big deal? For me, it just comes off as insincere, as if the writers of these media have no confidence in the story that they're telling and are trying to signal to the audience that they're "in on the joke" so to speak. It also speaks to what I believe is an inability or unwillingness to engage with serious emotions, since moments that are built up to be sad, uplifting, or menacing (among other things) are always being undercut by an attempt at humor. Furthermore, the deflation of any tension from the narrative makes it seem like the characters don't care about what's happening around them, as if they're your annoying buddy who makes snide comments at the expense of the movie that you're watching together. If that's the case, why should I care about what's happening onscreen if they treat life-threatening events like they don't ultimately matter?
What's your opinion on this phenomenon? Do you think it's no big deal, or does it bother you like it does me? And what made it so incredibly ubiquitous in today's media landscape?
To illustrate what I'm talking about, let me compare two scenes from two different superhero movies: Spider-Man 2 and Doctor Strange:
(For the latter clip, the part I'm talking about ends at the 2:49 mark)
Both scenes are supposed to be triumphant moments where the hero finally finds the resolve to suit up and fight the bad guy after relinquishing doubt in their abilities to do so. However, unlike the scene in Spider-Man 2, which follows through on the aforementioned emotional crescendo, the one in Doctor Strange kneecaps itself with a joke right when that's about to happen in an attempt to get a laugh out of an audience.
This is the cinematic equivalent of a literary technique known as bathos. As described by Wikipedia:
Now, like any literary technique, this can be used for good or ill. To illustrate an example of the former, let's use Robert Eggers' 2019 film The Lighthouse:
(EDIT: I was unable to find a version of this scene on YouTube that allowed playback on other sites, so I apologize for the inconvenience of not being able to watch it here)
In this scene, Willem Dafoe's character, Thomas Wake, goes on a tirade against Robert Pattinson's character, Ephriam Winslow, when the latter insults his cooking. It's an incredibly intense monologue, with Wake conjuring up an image of a mythical sea God emerging from the depths to strike Winslow down for his unkind comments. Yet the mood abruptly switches from serious to trivial at the end, with Winslow's quip deflating the tension that had been building. Why this technique works here is because the situation that had resulted in such an intense display of anger from Wake was ultimately rather trivial itself (or at least too trivial for someone to get that worked up over).
The reason why it doesn't work in Doctor Strange is because the situation, from a inter-diagetic perspective, is not so trivial. The fate of the universe is at stake and Strange has to rise to the occasion to defeat the great evil that threatens it. What the writers meant to signal, I believe, with a moment like this is that this is ultimately, from an extra-diagetic perspective, just a silly story about people in silly costumes battling each other with silly power, and that we, the audience, should not take this too seriously. However true this may be, it kills any semblance of sincerity that the story had going for it, as opposed to the scene in Spider-Man 2, which embraces sincerity despite the trappings of the material.
This is very common in entertainment today, and a lot of that can be contributed to the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The first Avengers movie was written and directed by Joss Whedon, whose writing style is best exemplified by the following quote:
As you can infer, Whedon makes plentiful use of bathos in his work. And due to the success of The Avengers, Marvel began attempting to copy his voice in their other films even when he left the franchise for good. Because of the success of the that franchise, other works have attempted to ape that particular style of writing, including the upcoming Dingeons & Dragons movie just to name one example:
So what's the big deal? For me, it just comes off as insincere, as if the writers of these media have no confidence in the story that they're telling and are trying to signal to the audience that they're "in on the joke" so to speak. It also speaks to what I believe is an inability or unwillingness to engage with serious emotions, since moments that are built up to be sad, uplifting, or menacing (among other things) are always being undercut by an attempt at humor. Furthermore, the deflation of any tension from the narrative makes it seem like the characters don't care about what's happening around them, as if they're your annoying buddy who makes snide comments at the expense of the movie that you're watching together. If that's the case, why should I care about what's happening onscreen if they treat life-threatening events like they don't ultimately matter?
What's your opinion on this phenomenon? Do you think it's no big deal, or does it bother you like it does me? And what made it so incredibly ubiquitous in today's media landscape?
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