Paxton wrote:...a Mighty Mouse cartoon in which said hero did drugs and punched a hooker or something. Now, this was a controversy based on the fact that it existed... and my one year old son will grow up in a world where he is about three clicks away from looking at bestiality pictures. Times they are a changin.
I looked up that mighty mouse thing, that's pretty funny. Reminds me of the BBFC ruling on the human centipede, can't find it online but originally they said that it's mere existence -the very idea of the centipede- was harmful, even to people who hadn't seen it! That's the only time I'd heard anything like it. Your son'll be perfect, just like you man.
jacobb1313 wrote:It's most evident in superhero films and comics. What were once fairly simple moral tales about fantastical beings fighting for "common", taken-for-granted moralities are now about complex soul-searching into the underbellies of the individual soul and the price of action
Yes, it'd hard to separate this trend from superhero franchises. This Alan Moore-ification (?) seems necessary in some ways. Christopher Reeves (collection plug) Superman would seem strange today, in a post-gitmo/water-boarding world no? Perhaps companies like pixar with the Incredibles etc have taken over the role of making stories with 'more certain' moralities.
jacobb1313 wrote:But on the filmmaking side, there's probably a bandwagon expectation of "darkness" under the guise of "complexity" going on, so yeah, that's a cyclical way of saying it's a cop-out, too.
The only counter-example I can think of -to getting darker- is Clooneys Batman films. They became increasingly camp and unpopular as a result, leading to...
mattorama12 wrote:I think you're on to something here. I also think with comic and superhero movies in particular, it's at least partly about trying to reach a different (bigger) audience.
Always follow the money dude