The Journey So Far

Media Maturity

I have a theory, a game theory... and a movie theory! Take that Mat pat! Cheap jokes aside I have this idea rolling around in this brain of mine for a while about the maturity of two sources of media in particular games, and movies. I think as a media movies (and by extension TV), has finally reached maturity, and that I think games as a media has hit its late teens as it where. This is a hard concept to actually make any claims about in general considering how media is generally a sub-topic of the political climate of the area that it was produced in. This can be seen in the Rocky franchise as somewhat a bi-product of the Cold War, with the major climax of (Rocky IV) being the main character winning vs a massive Russian champion on the world stage, and also Rambo going back and altering history in a way that made the US win the Vietnam War, to name two examples. This makes sense, as we are human beings creating stories, and it is a common saying to "write what you know." However if I ever deemed it worthy to take this advice, I would hardly write anything as the only thing I know for sure is that I know nothing.

Audience

It makes sense in order to write stories based on recent events. It doesn't however have to happen, and it doesn't necessarily come intentionally to the writer that they are being influenced by the geo-political climate of their times, as worries that seep into the subconscious happen. 9/11 happened. It had many repercussions in airline travel and media alike with Spider-Man and Men in Black II having to be changed in order to account for the attack. "Hollywood was that films released in the aftermath of the event should not be too much like 9/11. Representations of the World Trade Center became taboo. The original teaser trailer for Spider-Man (2001) showing the Twin Towers was withdrawn, while the climactic final scene of Men in Black II (2002) had to be reshot. For various other releases, the Twin Towers were erased in post-production." - Maria Flood and Micheal Frank from The Conservation in an article called "How 9/11 Changed Cinema." Ever since this event Cinema changed with even (according to the article), the Loki (2021) TV show pushing back against US President George W. Bush's claim that "freedom itself was attacked this morning," with a rebuttal of "the first and most oppressive lie ever uttered was the song of freedom." I don't have any claims for or against this point only that if 9/11 is a still relevant topic of conversation (and I am not saying that it isn't something to talk about) for a TV show to comment on 20 years after its creation, what other events still affect us in the media that we consume. A quick counter point to this may be "Well, 9/11 happened 23 years ago," - as of writing this, - "there are plenty of people still alive today that still could say exactly where they where on that day." That is fair, it is an event that occurred in modern history, and some might even say recent history, of course it affects the stories we tell. Well, we still make movies and TV shows about the Nordic Vikings, and they happened nearly 1200 years ago.

Author's Skill

Another reason it's hard to gauge is because there are just factually bad media. Now, you might argue that all art, is subjective, and that there is no such thing as a bad piece of art, but I disagree. Some pieces of art are just bad. My basic argument for this is that, in order for there to be a such thing as good art, there must also be bad art. Or in other words, for Mozart to be good, something else has to be bad. To extend this idea out, which I didn't plan to do until now, For art to be good, then there is a certain criteria which that art fulfills, if it doesn't accomplish the criteria, the art must be less than good, and if it doesn't meet enough of the criteria, then the art is considered bad. This could be for a multitude of reasons however, and I will not purpose a set of criteria that a piece of art must meet in order to be considered good here. One reason is that the writer is not good. Unfortunately we saw a lot of this case during the writer strike of 2023. Where other people had to step in for the writers who were on strike, and as such certain series suffered as a result. (Not that I think that the writers should not have went on strike). Now, I also don't hold writers solely to blame for this, but instead I am using the term writer here and further on as a stand in for any number of people that could have this possible affect on a piece of art. For example, publishers, producers, directors, publishers, actors, artists, editors, and publishers. Any one of these people could have a negative impact on a piece of art, especially publishers. I know, I kid, but also publishers could also be a stand in for anyone who has financed the development a "product," and are looking for a return, such as investors in a company. These investors often push for a product to release before it is ready. This causes rush cases and crunch times that typically are really hard on the people making the product as they try and reach a target with a deadline that without intervention would otherwise be missed.

As an example of this, I recently read a book that shall, that covered topics of polygamy, transgender, Gender Dysphoria, pan sexuality, and religion. Which was fine, I was completely fine with one of the main characters changing genders on a daily basis, because I think the author wrote that part well in terms of the context given within the story. (It makes contextual sense within the story, and it is not the character being indecisive about it). I was also completely fine with the main character having Gender Dysphoria, and in fact I think it was handled very well. The main character is a female that identifies as male, but since this is a first person book, they only ever introduce themselves as male, and the only time that you figure out that they are female is a "blink and you'll miss it" moment when they are talking about their body a significant portion into the book. If you do miss it you just think that he is bisexual/pansexual. I thought this was really well done, and a really mature way to handle it. But I think that overall the book falls apart at times with quality of the dialogue. (Not that I should speak on overall writing skill ;P).

Capability Maturity Model

I should also talk about the Capability Maturity Model (CMM). This is a model to label the level of capability someone is at a particular thing. With 5 levels: Initial, Repeatable, Defined, Capable, and Efficient. With initial being someone with no capability (a beginner). Repeatable being someone who can repeat the process with some help. Defined, being someone can define each step of the process themselves and can achieve the process without help. Capable, someone who can achieve the process and achieve quantitative results with agreed upon metrics. Efficient being a master of the task, and is beginning to refine/optimize the process. This is a slightly modified version of what is listed in the link but it works. A Efficient writer could be someone like Brandon Sanderson, George RR Martin, etc. While a Capable writer could be some writer who made their first critically acclaimed book / movie maybe Zerocalcare from "Tear Along the dotted Line". Who after writing comics for a long time, was noticed and was able to receive a show on Netflix, and then created a second "This World Can't Tear Me Down."

Author's Maturity

The final reason that I will cover (hopefully, for both our sake dear reader), is the writer's maturity level. If a writer is immature then there is a significant chance that the media that they create will end up immature. Of course, here I am not talking about the physical maturity of the author, I am talking about the emotional, spiritual, and mental levels of maturity. Each being more or less important depending on the topic that the media explores. Any lacking of any of these three types in respect to the idea / topic will be felt and as such takes away from the experience. Obviously different topics have different tolerances for insufficient requirements. For example a high school drama about a group of friends, could arguably benefit from a lack of emotional maturity, if it is in first person. This could translate as the main character being emotionally immature, which most high school students are. So one could be forgiven if they do not have the necessary emotional maturity for this topic. While a more high stakes topic like religion would require high mental maturity, high emotional maturity, and high spiritual maturity. For example, if there was a world in which we could prove the existence of god(s), being able to come up with a cast of characters that have a diverse standpoint on the topic, and executing it properly would require high levels in all three.

To reiterate the reason that I bring this up, is that it is hard to tell for certain if the medium has matured for a lot of reasons, Political Climate, Writer Maturity, Writer skill. Again, here I am using the term writer as a stand in for anyone who has put in a significant enough effort into a piece of media in order to have an impact. The main reason I am choosing the word writer is that from books to music to video games to TV, there is a writer attached to it. Sorry, Writers.

Books

I'll make this one quick, I think books have been around for

Movies

Stunt Man

Games