Something you read/watched/played that changed your outlook in 2019 - for the New Year and decade

[Monika H.]

I haven't really played anything that particularly struck me the last year, but literature-wise Jack Kerouac's Visions of Cody really struck me.
I know that Kerouac's most famous work is On the Road, but in Visions of Cody he really outlined the fundamental themes of his latter years and actually made me reconsider Christianity in itself under a new light.

Then follows Henry Darger's In the Realms of the Unreal ( full title The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glandeco-Angelinian War Storm Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion). I haven't actually read the book ( it's not published here, and it's over 90000000 words long), but the themes of Darger's work and life, as an abused and abandoned child really struck out to me, due to my personal experiences on the matter.
The idea of such a man, and like him many other men and women, that create such beautiful fantasy worlds that the world will never see, always brings a tear to my eye.
This line, from Declaration of Children's rights, always gets me: "We call right of children to play, to be happy, and to dream; the right to normal sleep of the night's season; the right to an education, that we may have an equality of opportunity for developing all that are in us of mind and heart."

Finally, even though I had heard both @Nekromantik2 and my lovely spouse talk about them in glowing terms, I decided to watch both the Nekromantik movies, and I have to say that while I the first one was quite enjoyable, the sequel made me think much more, sometimes keeping me awake at night. I guess that what really got me was the mixture of mundane and horrific themes, and the multiple possible interpretations of the admittedly over the top ending.
To top off the autism, I had managed to contact the director and one of the lead actors, leading to a quite pleasant mail correspondence from which I learned much, and not only about the movies. Really, the pleasantness and availability they gave to a random sperg writing to them out of nowhere really warmed my heart.

What about you, my fellow Kiwis?
What's something you have read, or watched or played at in the last year that changed your outlook on life, or your way of thinking, or just left a vast impression on you?
Share your thoughts.

 

[Token Weeaboo]

Ajin Demi Human is something I'd always throw out there. I got into it early 2019 and I've read all their Manga and it plays on the general concept of human mortality and the value of it. Some people can't be killed but there are many that do with two protagonists being contrary to one another. One is logical type while the other is the more emotional type. There was one specific scene where the logical one told the emotional one that thousands of people will die in some far off country and you won't feel a thing, but when someone close to you dies it's like the world is ending.

It made me think about how much emotional value we as humans actually put into one another lives. Outside of our selfish instincts to stay alive ourselves we don't think about strangers being important. It also made me notice that general empathy has been declining ever since the creation of the internet. Not in the sense that someone makes a joke to lighten the mood yet acknowledge how it was a horrible event. (ex. I can make a 911 joke and explain how the event was a bad time in the same breath) Except in the sense that we don't care about other peoples struggles and overall dismiss how they got to believe what they believe.

People have stopped talking face to face, it's seen as rude. Hardly anyone tries to understand someones real views and only addresses what they assume they mean when if you don't know you should ask questions until you get a better understanding. General human interaction is all in all low in the first world and instead of being able to speak like civil people it's replaced with bats and torches. Not to mention cheers and celebration when someones lives are ruined or even when someone winds up dead.

TL;DR- it made me realize that empathy and human lives emotional value is zero. It's more of a stock market. what happens depends on how much you're emotionally invested in.

 

[Vampirella]

the sequel made me think much more, sometimes keeping me awake at night.

Sorry I keep you up at night.

We just watched the director's cut Dark City. The last time I saw the movie was when it came out in theaters back in 98. I don't really want to give away too much for anyone that hasn't seen the movie, but it got me thinking, what makes an individual an individual. Is it our memories and life experiences, or is there some deeply buried spark in our brains that's always there.

It got me thinking about people that have had amnesia, and how hard it is for them to rebuild their lives. Some of them talk about seeing old friends and loved ones and feeling they should feel something but don't know why. It's really interesting to think of how much of who we are is built on our past experiences. That's why when I've been asked if I could go in my past and change anything, I say no, because with out that past I wouldn't be me and I'd hate to lose it.