csheehan

Though it is a television show and not a film, I was contending with this idea while watching the show “Gotham,” which adapts the characters of Batman’s comic book universe for a television series. I was initially displeased with the show, because it was pulling a move that I typically have no desire to see. The characters are not only taken out of their specific contexts (as established by the comic books), but also presented as younger versions of the characters as we already know them. To me, this move feels contrived and quickly loses its novelty. I actually have a lot of criticisms of the show, but I no longer fault it for its infidelity to the show – mostly because, as you indicated at the end of your article, we don’t have to judge the success of an adaptation by its fidelity to the source text. In that sense, I’ve begun to appreciate the show for what it is.

I recently encountered the concept of The Shadow, and though i’m familiar with what an archetype is and what it represents, I realized that I’m not too familiar with the Jungian archetypes. I think your explanation and contextualizations of The Shadow, as well as the Animus/Anima, were thoughtful and helped to clarify these concepts for me.

I also think that your exercise will make for some interesting fiction, which my own writing currently lacks. Thank you for sharing!

I’ve only recently begun to develop a distaste for supermarkets, and though I don’t have a particular reason why, I think some of the themes that you explore in this article probably reflect the foundation of my distaste to some extent.

I also felt compelled to read this because I had been playing a text adventure game that takes place in a single aisle of a supermarket (thanks to an article by IRBurnett on text adventure games). In my opinion, there’s some interesting continuity.

Thank you for sharing!

I really enjoyed your article. It gave me a glimpse into an era of gaming that I never really experienced.

I do tend to think that the argument about whether or not video games can be considered art addresses a foregone conclusion. I think most emerging mediums go through this same scrutiny before the argument simply loses steam, and then refocuses on a different emerging medium. At this point, video games are an established cultural medium, and only getting stronger as such – to briefly sing the praises of the argument’s effect – thanks to developers’ desire to make games that have artistic aims. For me, the conclusion of this argument is: of course video games can be art. I’d like to think that this is an obvious conclusion, but maybe this point of view comes with having grown up playing video games.

In any case, I look forward to playing some (hopefully all) of the text adventures mentioned in the article. Thanks for sharing!