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TRON: Ares and the Literal Emptiness of Modern Blockbusters | The Backdrop
🕑 Added 2025-10-21 15:05:09 +0000 UTCThis week's episode of The Backdrop is now available!
Comments
Tim Wilson
Excellent work, and well worth the length. I always enjoy learning something new about cinema and I’m reminded again to give Thunderbolts a go. I’m suddenly taken back to parts of big movies that actually made me emotional and it’s often that small moment of personal sacrifice or empathy for a stranger. Having watched m3gan 2 yesterday I was wondering about why it was just so… lame, and one of the reasons was that for all the talk of an AI apocalypse, we never actually see anyone panic, or react, outside of the main characters. Tell don’t show indeed.
Swift Justice
None of this is particularly new, mind. Can arguably be traced back to Ronald Reagan even before the End Of History era that consequences simply aren't a thing that happens to America, and it's very bipartisan.
Damon Wilson
The political zeitgeist in the US and UK since 2016 (thanks to Trump 1 and Brexit respectively) has had a strong overtone of 'ignore the likely consequences'. Politicians and voters are increasingly playing the 'do as you will shall be the whole of the law' game as if future consequences have been abolished by edict. The 'nobody got hurt' element of modern city destruction movies seems just an extension of that sort of thinking. Now everyone is acting like we're not on the brink of a global economic meltdown because of the AI investment bubble being about to burst. The Obama-era movies were, I think, so caring as a reaction to 2008 and the subsequent 99%ers. How will entertainment react to an even bigger economic crash? Best Backdrop to date. Many thanks.
