Anghus Houvouras on the Derivative Age…
de·riv·a·tive
adjective
1. imitative of the work of another person, and usually disapproved of for that reason.
synonyms: imitative, unoriginal, uninventive, unimaginative, uninspired
originating from, based on, or influenced by.
2. something that is based on another source.
I struggled over the last week trying to give it a name. Something that describes this copy/paste creative society we find ourselves in. Where every comic books is a variation on a previously written story. And every comic book movie is an adaptation of a story that had once been printed in a comic. It led to a series of heated exchanges between writers, artists, and fans of what I would describe as ‘geek culture’. Some people thought I was making straw man arguments. Others thought I hit the nail on the head. After six straight days of debate, the most apt description came to mind. Currently geek culture is squarely planted in the derivative age.
The trigger could have been any number of things. Marvel Studios announcing their next 19 films. Marvel Comics announcing a new take on Secret War. Reading an issue of Scott Snyder’s highly praised Batman where he, once again, finds a wrinkle on a previously written story and hammers out his own variation. Hearing the name ‘The Force Awakens‘ as the title of the new Star Wars movie. Toy Story 4. Seeing a trailer for Peter Jackson’s latest brutally long and boring Hobbit film.
I feel like Roddy Piper in They Live. I have the glasses on. I can see the troubling signs of a culture going to rot, but no one else believes me. The only way to get anyone on my side is to have a painfully long fight until I force them to look at the world through my glasses.
That’s pretty much why I’m here writing this column today.
This is supposedly the greatest time in the history of the geek. The entertainment industry is catering to us. The Walking Dead is the number one drama show on television. Big Bang Theory is the number one comedy. Our top movies worldwide are based on comic books and toys. People keep telling me this is a reason to celebrate. Back in 2011 when I went to my first San Diego Comic Con and saw clips for Avengers, I was there. It felt like the movie and television business was being transformed solely to please me and other like-minded geeks. Even saying the word ‘geek’ out loud felt like some kind of accomplishment. This was the same word used to torment me in my prepubescent days when I was reading comics, playing Nintendo, and avoiding social interaction. They would spit out words like ‘geek’ and ‘nerd’ with such venom. These were not badges of honor or proclamations of superiority.
Now, in this new enlightened age, geeks can be proud. Nerds no longer need to cower behind their trapper keepers (or iPads). Because they live in a world of movies, television shows, and video games that cater to their every craving. While the next few years feels like an orgy of excess with countless Marvel movies, DC Comics launching a slew of films, X-Men movies, Fantastic Four, Jurassic World, Deadpool, more Transformers, Big Hero 6, Terminator, sequels, prequels, and on and on and on…
I still feel like we’re not getting anything new. That’s because we’re not.
I have a theory. I doubt it will be a popular one. I’m convinced that half the reason geek culture is so thrilled with all this fan service is because it validates us. After years of reading comic books, buying action figures, and clocking ridiculously long hours in front of the tv playing video games, the rest of the world is just not getting on board. There are lots of people who knew squat about Iron Man before Robert Downey Jr. donned the armor. But we did. We knew who he was, we knew about his battle with alcoholism, we knew what Extremis was before there even was an Iron Man 3. When those familiar stories are adapted to the big screen, we feel as though our tastes have been validated. Our geek lifestyle has taken over popular culture and there’s a certain amount of ego at play in our celebration of its success.
What bothers me most about this derivative age we live in is this glowing sense of contentment everyone is expressing. The vast majority just seems to be pleased as punch that this fan service era exists. The quality of the projects seems almost arbitrary. Why do Transformers movies that everyone claims are garbage still billion dollar moneymakers? How do the Hobbit films continue to make a billion dollars every year when there is so little passion for the finished product?
It’s like the 21st Century has been an assault on our collective dopamine levels. We’re getting assaulted with geek culture and consuming every ounce of it. Now we’re getting more. A steadier stream of geek movies in the theater. Soon enough we’ll be getting a comic book movie nearly every 90 days. The TV shows are being produced at a higher rate: Arrow, Flash, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Supergirl, Constantine. The studios are pushing product with the subtlety of Walter White and getting everybody hooked. Unlike Heisenberg, the quality of the product isn’t always exceptional.
What doesn’t worry me is a particular movie or studio or comic book. It’s the simple mindset of complacency. And what worries me most is not the complacency of fans, but the complacency of creators. The comic book writers happy to get their hands on their favorite superhero and do a variation on their most favorite stories of yesteryear. Or the filmmaker who makes some original creation before being bought by the studio to helm the next Star Wars films.
The derivative age frightens me more as a creator than it does as a fan. There are those who thought geek culture movies were a trend that would run it’s course, but it’s clear that there is another decade of this already in the works.
I wrote in a column earlier this year about the dangers of “Our Zombie Culture” where familiar properties aren’t allowed to die because of the importance of franchises and recognizable properties in Hollywood. The combination of derivative creativity and risk averse studios continuing to reboot properties is troubling.
This is the kind of thinking that got us Amazing Spider-Man 2 and has forced Sony into some baffling choices to keep their mediocre, repackaged franchise alive. This same malady will be something Marvel & Warner Bros. will face down the road.
I am desperate for something new. For creators who are willing to carve a new path rather than follow the footsteps of others. I don’t need to see another origin story. I don’t need scrubbed versions of comic stories adapted for the big screen. If, as a society, we are content with the derivative age, then so be it.
I for one will continue wrestling any takes in the seedy alleys of the internet until you see this era for what it truly is:
Derivative.
Anghus Houvouras is a North Carolina based writer and filmmaker. His latest work, the novel My Career Suicide Note, is available from Amazon. Follow him on Twitter.
