Analytics, American Express. MBA, IIM Kozhikode. UCG NET-JRF, English Literature. BA, MA, Presidency University.
Junior Contributor II
Duality in horror, and the ending of Peele's 'US'Duality (doppelgangers, alter egos) is a common theme in thriller/horror texts and films. This goes as far (or further) back as the Victorian period (Dracula and Van Helsing as mirror images/Jekyll and Hyde), and continues today (The Nun, Valak and Sister Irene as foils to each other/the twins in Malignant). 'US' (2019) deals with doppelgangers – every citizen has one, and these 'Tethered' counterparts live in dire poverty in the tunnels beneath the city. They are 'savage' and 'monstrous', unlike their peers who live among us. The ending, however, reveals that the protagonist of the film was never one of 'us', but in fact a tethered doppelganger who had switched places as a child. Unlike the rest of the Tethered, she speaks and moves fluently, behaving 'civilised' as opposed to 'savage'. There is clear commentary in this twist of how the environment and social upbringing of an individual can create a stark contrast in how their identity, behaviour, and habits are formed: The protagonist turned out so different from the rest of the Tethered, only because of the economic and social support she recieved as she was brought up. How does this twist impact the themes of duality present in horror and thriller genres? Does it make us reflect differently on the monstrous villains we see in Michael Myers or Dr Hyde? Does it make us reconsider their motivations? |
Newspeak, 1984, and Big BrotherOrwell’s 1984 ends with an in depth record of Newspeak, the language imposed upon citizens by the novel’s fascist government. 2) reconstructing words to make them ‘noun centric’, such as eliminating the words ‘cut’/’cutting’/etc, and making them ‘knifing’/’knifed’ and so on. – Do the words corporates use modify our understanding of social structures? When Facebook switches the name for a user’s personal page from ‘profile’ to ‘timeline’, do we think of the personal page as less static and virtual, more a tangible piece of our lives? – Censorship in both mass media and private social media. Instagram and Google by default blur out posts containing certain words and images (‘Safe Search’) – there is little regulation as to what these words/images must be. Is the possibility that by routinely hiding these terms and visuals, the user’s reality is reconstructed to erase certain perspectives and realities?
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I watched you Nae Nae, now what? - Is the lack of lyrics a reflection on the attitudes of today's popular music listeners as a whole?Comparison between songs that are more recent and ones that are older throw up a large number of differences in terms of lyrics. One prime difference is that newer songs have an increasingly decreasing (heh, see what I did there?) number of lyrics. Is this constant reduction in the number of words in a song a reflection on Is it a combination of all three?
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"National Anthem” by Lana Del Rey as a Commentary on American Nationalism and Political Structures | |
I think the source material from Ed and Lorrane Warren also revolves strongly around these themes – especially since we don’t see Christian messaging in Wan’s previous work. | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
Agreed. | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
But what’s a horror movie without scares? | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
Yes, I also felt bothered by the problematic messaging of the victims of the Salem witch hunts being actual witches. | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
Yes – this is possibly the first of the Conjuring movies to have physical and permanent consequences of the haunting. | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
Thank you! This is such a huge compliment. 🙂 | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
You hardly need to look as far as Ed and Lorraine Warren to find liing proof of that. | The Conjuring Universe - Religion, Horror, and Annabelle: Creation |
So much of Lana’s old work has these themes, but her more current work goes beyond and often freely criticises more explicitly I feel – Looking for America, or Woodstock in my Mind, for instance are openly disapproving of the prevalent social and political structures.