Christopher Nolan's mind-bending, genre-blending, sci-fi-heist thriller Inception ruled the weekend box office for a second week in a row, taking in another $43.5 million and holding off Angelina Jolie's Salt, which nabbed $36.5 million. In its third week of release, Despicable Me clocked in at $24.1 million. All in all, it was a rare summer weekend in which the top three films were all original stories with nary a sequel, remake or pre-existing franchise in sight. And despite Jolie's latest action debut, Inception continues to be the summer movie many folks are buzzing about.
In a recent interview with MTV, Nolan talked about how Star Wars has been his inspirational benchmark as a filmmaker, and how he hopes to give viewers of his movies a similar experience.
Now whenever I hear a moviemaker saying, in effect, that he wants to make the next Star Wars, I think, Good luck. Few movies have changed the game the way George Lucas' 1977 space opera did.
That said, my wife and I took in Inception this weekend. As with most hyper-hyped movies these days (Avatar, anyone?), I expected to be disappointed.
I wasn't, at least not from a storytelling perspective. (Some of its suicide-driven violence deserves more attention than I'll give it here. So read Paul Asay's review for that.) The sheer originality of Nolan's film about thieves invading dreams actually exceeded my expectations. Not everyone feels that way, of course. Not even all of my colleagues. Some actively disliked the thing. But for my part, as I walked out of the theater, I told my wife I had never seen anything quite like Inception. It might not have made quite the impact on me that Star Wars made when I was 6. But it was in the ballpark in terms of sheer storytelling audacity. For me it joins a very short list of movies that reset the narrative boundary markers on what can be achieved in a film.
And that brings me to this question: What movies, new or old, have had a similar effect on you? What stories left your jaw on the floor?
I wasn't a very happy kid.
I was intense. Moody. Liked things my way. Got mad—really mad—when things didn't go my way.
God must have known I needed some help, because in 5th grade I met Joe. Joe was pretty much my polar opposite. He was even-keeled when I boiled over. He would look at me like an exasperated parent when I would drop all the dice on a game of Risk I was losing badly. ("Nuke attack!") Joe put up with me, but he never shied away from telling me I was acting like an idiot.
Joe lived two blocks north from my house if I cut through the neighbors' yards on the way to school. We did everything together—from fifth grade all the way through college. We played Risk and the arcade game Twin Cobra. We helped each other on our paper routes. Lived at the swimming pool in the summers. Listened to music. Talked a lot about girls. A lot.
In short, we were best friends.
Joe turns 40 this weekend; I'll cross that threshold myself in a couple weeks. But we still keep in touch regularly, sharing stories about our kids and their exploits—not to mention the music we're listening to these days. It's impossible for me to picture what life might have been like without Joe as that steadying influence throughout the awfulness and insecurity of my adolescence.
And yet, according to a New York Times article published in June, a growing number of teachers, school administrators and other folks involved with children are actively seeking to discourage the classic "best friend" connection between young students. Why? Because they believe the inherently exclusive nature of a best-friend relationship may be hurtful to other students who feel excluded.
The Times talked to several people around the country who are increasingly adopting a skeptical stance toward exclusive friendships. "When two children discover a special bond between them, we honor that bond, provided that neither child overtly or covertly excludes or rejects others," said Jan Mooney, a psychologist at the Town School, a nursery through eighth grade private school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. "However, the bottom line is that if we find a best friend pairing to be destructive to either child, or to others in the classroom, we will not hesitate to separate children and to work with the children and their parents to ensure healthier relationships in the future."
Christine Laycob, director of counseling at Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School in St. Louis, echoed those sentiments. "I think it is kids' preference to pair up and have that one best friend," she said. "As adults— teachers and counselors—we try to encourage them not to do that. We try to talk to kids and work with them to get them to have big groups of friends and not be so possessive about friends."
Times reporter Hilary Stout noted that the motivation behind this trend is to protect those who might feel locked out of the relational picture.
Not everyone is convinced, however, that best friendships need to be viewed with such a wary eye.
"No one can teach you what a great friend is, what a fair-weather friend is, what a treacherous and betraying friend is except to have a great friend, a fair-weather friend or a treacherous and betraying friend," said Michael Thompson, a psychologist and author of Best Friends, Worst Enemies: Understanding the Social Lives of Children. "When a teacher is trying to tone down a best-friend culture, I would like to know why. Is it causing misery for the class? Or is there one girl who does have friends but just can't bear the thought that she doesn't have as good a best friend as another? That to me is normal social pain. If you're mucking around too much in the lives of kids who are just experiencing normal social pain, you shouldn't be."
I wonder, sometimes, what the future holds for non-digital entertainment. And an unlikely event raised that question for me earlier this week.
My parents moved to town last weekend, bringing with them several boxes of miscellaneous flotsam and jetsam that every move inevitably stirs up. I thought I'd gotten everything they had for me—you know, college notebooks, trophies from high school, a picture from my college graduation. But when I went over to see how they were settling in a couple days later, they had one final box for me.
"Comics and Baseball Cards," it said.
I was bit perplexed, because I was pretty sure I sold all my baseball cards at a garage sale decades ago. And my teenage comic book collection? Well, it's safely tucked away in our basement and doesn't get much sunlight.
But there it was, a box of comics and baseball cards.
I began digging through the box and quickly realized that none of it was actually mine, as far as I could tell. And there were some pretty old comics in the box. Like, 1958 old.
"Umm, Dad," I asked, "where did these come from?"
"I don't know," he said. "Why?"
"Well … there's some pretty interesting stuff in here."
Indeed there was. The real prize was DC Comics' Aquaman, No. 1 from 1962 … a comic, the Internet helpfully informed me, that might be worth a pretty penny.
Here's where the nostalgia kicks in: I didn't remember ever seeing these comics before (and, to be honest, we still haven't figured out where they came from). But I do recall spending hours in my adolescence buying, sorting, reading and re-reading comic books. The musty smell of these almost 50-year-old comics unleashed a torrent of memories in me—happy memories about an on-again-off-again hobby that continued through my teen years.
I also rifled through stacks and stacks of baseball cards, which also triggered memories of my brief flirtation with that hobby.
I know this is a long way around to make a point, but here it is: Pouring over the comics' yellowed paper made me wonder how many kids growing up today will have a similar experience. Do baseball cards and comics still hold much appeal?
I realize, of course, that contemporary comics are loaded with their fair share of content concerns. I'm really not advocating for comic book collecting here. Mostly I'm just pondering whether the proliferation of all things digital—iPhones, YouTube, MySpace, Wii, etc.—means that simple, unplugged, analog pursuits like arranging one's comics or baseball cards are doomed to go the way of the dodo, killed off by their digital replacements.
If so, I suspect fewer folks 50 years from now will know the unexpected pleasure of uncovering a long-forgotten box full of musty old stories.
Culture, it's said, is like an ocean. And we are the fish swimming there. For the most part, we're not really aware of the water around us. It's just there … always there. It's where we swim and live.
That comparison is helpful, I think, because it reminds us that our culture—that vast vortex of ideas and images and values and habits and preferences and beliefs—swirls constantly around us, whether we're aware of it or not. And it's constantly transmitting a steady stream of information.
Even if we're trying to pay attention and think critically about the metaphorical water we're swimming it—which is one of the things we're trying to do here at Plugged In—it can be challenging to recognize where and how our culture's values seep in and begin to influence the way I see the world.
When it comes to my children, however, culture's influence is much more apparent. Because my kiddos are so young—Henry's nearly 4 and my daughter, Annabeth, isn't quite 2—it's pretty easy to spot when something new turns up.
Like, say, a song about lollipops.
A couple days ago, my wife came back from a baby shower with a bunch of baby-themed lollipops. Henry, of course, wanted one. And we eventually relented to his pleas.
After plopping the sugary confection in his little mouth, Henry did something that caught me utterly off guard: He started singing the song "Lollipop": "Lollipop, lollipop/Oh lolli lolli lolli/Lollipop!" As the lyrics tumbled out of his sucker-filled mouth, he danced delightedly through the kitchen, as happy, it seemed, to be singing this silly song as he was about the candy itself.
Here's the thing: I have no idea where he heard this song. Usually when some new cultural influence pops up, I can identify its origin. But I was stumped on this one. All I know is that my child, who's not yet 4, knows the lyrics to a song first made famous by the Cordettes waaaaayyyyy back in 1958—48 years before Henry was born.
To me it was a breathtaking illustration of how cultural influence works. This song has been floating around in the cultural current for 52 years now. And now that particular current has swept by my son—somehow, without me knowing it—as he happily swims about in his little world.
Thankfully, this example of culture's influence on my family isn't one that I need to spend too much time brooding about. But it is a sobering reminder that the oceanic currents of culture really are swirling all around us, whether we're aware of them or not. And my little "fishies"—as well as me, a bigger, older, and balder "fishie"—swim in that water every day.
Every week, Hollywood industry insiders speculate on how well new movies will do at the box office. Most weeks, these wizened mavens are pretty accurate. Every now and then, however, there's a big surprise.
That's what happened last weekend, as two rebooted relics from the 1980s squared off at the multiplex: The Karate Kid and The A-Team.
Many prognosticators expected pretty much a dead heat between these two old-school franchises. But that's not what happened. Instead, The Karate Kid kicked up $56 million—about $20 million more than anyone thought it would make and more than double The A-Team's $26 million take.
Writing about the surprise success of the new Karate Kid, movie critic and movie-industry analyst Scott Mendelson said, "We may have all ranted and railed about the idea … of remaking such a beloved '80s classic at the time. … [But] this is exactly the kind of movie that studios should be making. At just $40 million, this star-driven drama will be absurdly profitable for Sony even if Toy Story 3 steals most of its young audience next weekend. … And, if I may editorialize for a moment, I must say it was refreshing to see a film that starred a young African-American and an older Asian that was not advertised in any way, shape, or form, as an 'ethnic' film."
I wrote Plugged In's review of The Karate Kid last week, and I have to say, I feel just like Mendelson does. As a GenXer, I didn't really want anyone tampering with one of my favorite movies from my teen years. But I have to admit that the remake, starring Jaden Smith and Jackie Chan, works pretty well on an emotional level. And with fewer profanities and drug references than the original, it's actually more family friendly in a couple key categories as well (albeit with a few more spiritual worldview issues for families to sort through).
As for The A-Team, well, it seems that more of everything—explosions, death and sexual content—actually translated into less than was hoped for at the box office.
So I'm in the checkout line at Safeway the other day with my almost 4-year-old son, Henry. This is always a touchy moment, because he's usually ready to be anywhere else by the time we get done grocery shopping.
This particular day, however, something caught his attention. "Daddy, it's Jake!" he chirped. Looking around, I took a second to realize what he was talking about. And it was Jake. No, Jake Gyllenhall wasn't doing his grocery shopping in Colorado Springs that day. It was Jake Sully, the 10-foot-tall blue Na'vi hero from the movie Avatar. Specifically, it was a life-sized cardboard cutout of his character, a display for the just-released DVD of James Cameron's movie.
It was a moment that, quite frankly, took my breath away.
My son hasn't seen Avatar, of course. And it took me a moment to realize how he could possibly recognize the big blue alien in front of us. So what's the answer, you ask?
Two words: Happy Meal.
I'm a bit embarrassed to admit it, but McDonald's is a brand Henry knows about. Why? Because they package their cheeseburgers with toys. Once upon a time, we purchased a Happy Meal for him that included, you guessed it, a Jake Sully action figure. I probably told him what the character's name was. And Henry remembered that when we ran into Jake at Safeway.
Henry doesn't know about Wendy's or Burger King or Carl's Junior. But he does know about McDonald's, because the Happy Meals come with cool "special treats."
Using hamburgers to push movies. Using movies to push hamburgers. And pushing both of those things at 4-year-olds everywhere who have put two and two together and realized that the Golden Arches equals a fun new toy.
Call it the Trojan Happy Meal.
Obviously, Daddy and Mommy bear responsibility here, too, for purchasing the Happy Meal in the first place. That said, Henry's ability to recognize a movie character because of a Happy Meal toy he'd gotten is sobering evidence of how powerful and ubiquitous entertainment and fast-food marketing have become today.
But apparently that's not enough sex appeal for the average pageant watcher. Just a year after Carrie Prejean came under fire (and eventually lost her Miss California crown) for racy and topless pictures that leaked online, the Miss USA pageant has decided to add a lingerie segment to the competition. Specifically, each contestant has to pose for photos in a hotel room wearing skimpy underwear and sporting sultry, suggestive expressions. A couple of contestants even opted to go with braless outfits, wearing only open shirts and panties.
The resulting images look like they'd be more at home in a Victoria's Secret catalog than in a beauty pageant.
Pageant owner Donald Trump has been unapologetic. "Whether we like it or not, beautiful women will always attract ratings," he said. Trump also recognizes that the images push the envelope, but in the end he thinks they're acceptable for broadcast television (the pageant will air May 16 on NBC). "I think they've maybe gone a little over the top this year," he said. "These pictures are a little wild. [But] the girls are incredible. … They go about as far as you can go on network television, which is pretty far."
Keith Lewis, director of the Miss California pageant, added that the winner of the Miss USA competition goes on to compete in the international Miss Universe pageant. And standards on the global stage are less conservative than those in the United States, he said. "Miss USA is a feeder contest for Miss Universe where we go off and compete against Miss Venezuela and Miss France, countries that are progressive in their fashions and acceptance of sexier looks."
Miss USA spokeswoman Lark-Marie Anton is equally matter-of-fact in defending the lingerie photos. "We are in the business of beauty and the contestants who compete for the title of Miss USA are not afraid to be sexy. These ladies are the full packages—smart, accomplished, relevant and sexy. That said, I think these photos definitely break the stereotype of what a 'pageant girl' looks like."
Not everyone, however, is buying the lie that "beauty" and "sexy" should be synonymous. "As a mom of a 13-year-old daughter, I worry about the fact that these young women are held up in front of our young girls as symbols to be emulated, and it's certainly a concern for American moms," said Penny Nance, CEO of Concerned Women of America.
Tim Winter, president of the Parents Television Council, put his concerns more bluntly: "There has been growing debate over the line between a beauty pageant and soft-core pornography," he said. "And I think this year's pageant not only erases that line, it obliterates it."
Something curious has been happening with my Facebook profile lately: I've been getting friend requests from lots of relatives. Some are cousins who are younger than I am. But, interestingly, several have come from my parents' siblings. I'm now "friends" with a couple of my aunts who are in their '70s (and if you're reading this, Claudette and Charlene, I'm sorry I haven't written more).
Then, of course, there are my parents. My dad, who is 60, has always been an early adopter when it comes to technology. He and my mom share a profile, and they got on Facebook shortly after I did.
Now, I'm a couple decades removed from my rebellious teen years (thankfully that phase didn't last too long), so I didn't think twice about being Facebook friends with my parents. And I always think it's kinda cute when they write something on my wall ("Aww, mom sent me a Facebook message!"). Some younger folk, though, might not be so thrilled with the idea of their parents (or other older relatives) having access to their Facebook profiles and the goings-on there.
Which begs the question: Just how common is it for parents and their children to be Facebook friends?
Well, this being the information age and all, we can actually answer that question. The electronics shopping site Retrevo recently conducted a survey of parents' online media habits and found that 48% of them are Facebook friends with their kids.
So what about you, dear reader? Are you Facebook friends with your parents or your children? And how has that experience been for you? Awkward? Awesome? Somewhere in between? We want to hear your stories.
It was a Nightmare at the box office this weekend.
Specifically, the remake of Wes Craven's 1984 horror flick A Nightmare on Elm Street slashed the competition. The movie raked in an estimated $32.2 million—and that despite the fact that mainstream critics treated the film about the same way Freddy Krueger treats his victims.
Coming in at second was How to Train Your Dragon (still going strong with an estimated $10.8 million in its sixth weekend), followed by Date Night and The Back-up Plan. The weekend's only other wide-release debut, Furry Vengeance, clocked in at No. 5—perhaps proving that people actually do listen to movie critics at least some of the time.
So what are we to make of Freddy's ongoing popularity 26 years after his nightmarish debut? If anything, Nightmare's strong showing at the box office reinforces two longstanding trends. High-profile horror movies are often bulletproof, and nostalgia, even when it comes to a B-movie franchise like Elm Street, can be a powerful force. As movie critic Susan Granger of the SSG Syndicate noted, "Never has the lure of the recognizable been more obvious than in this familiar yet forgettable reboot of Wes Craven's 1980s horror franchise."
And speaking of nostalgia, Nightmare is kicking off what's likely to be a big summer for '80s retreads. Also coming down the pike in the next couple months are The A-Team and The Karate Kid. And 2011 will see a remake of Footloose.
This trend is nothing new, of course. But it seems that with each passing year, every remotely successful franchise or TV show from the '70s and '80s is getting another look.
It was an interesting week on the Billboard 200 album chart. Two soundtracks clocked in among the Top 5—an unusual happening in its own right. Even more strange, however, was that both were collections from artists who've been around a long time: Madonna and AC/DC.
Glee: The Music, The Power of Madonna snagged the top spot on the chart. The seven-song offering featured the cast of Fox's show Glee(you can find our review of its Madonna-themed episode here) performing some of Madonna's biggest hits, mostly from the '80s and '90s: "Borderline," "Like a Virgin," "Like a Prayer," "Express Yourself" and "Vogue." Only two hits were more recent: ""What It Feels Like for a Girl" and "4 Minutes." (iTunes purchasers also got "Burning Up").
And then there was the soundtrack to Iron Man 2, which features 15 anthems from Aussie rockers AC/DC spanning the band's 37-year career. It came in at No. 4.
What are we to make of these soundtracks' strong performances?
On the most basic level, I think it speaks to the enduring popularity of their contributors. Even after 30 or so years (a few more for AC/DC, a few less for Madonna), people still love these artists' music. Longtime fans are willing to pony up for yet another version of songs they already own, while younger fans may be buying their music for the first time.
Even more significantly, though, I think these albums' strong sales speaks to the increasing symbiosis between all aspects of the entertainment world. Movies and television need artists' music. And musicians need TV and movies to help them stay relevant in a music world that's increasingly fragmented.
It wasn't that long ago that Madonna and AC/DC might have been branded sell-outs for licensing their music to be used in such a way. Now they're just savvy marketers doing what they must to survive.
The same dynamic holds true for the people tasked with assembling musical talent for their properties. Why should a movie or television producer take a chance on some unknown indie band when artists the caliber of AC/DC and Madonna are more than willing to make their music available?
From the entertainment industry perspective, everybody wins. Whether fans of Glee and Iron Man are well served by that synergy is another question altogether.
Nevertheless, every time a song or album helps a TV show or a movie—and vice versa—it will likely reinforce this accelerating trend in the entertainment world.
A while back I was at a party where the hosts played the movie Happy Feet for the kids while the adults mingled upstairs. I hadn't seen the movie before, so I sat down with my almost-4-year-old son to watch a bit of it (he was quite interested in the dancing, animated penguins). I hadn't been there more than a couple minutes before the film's strong—arguably preachy—environmentalist message began to get on my nerves. Animals good. Humans bad. BAD.
Happy Feet is just one recent example of Hollywood highlighting environmentalism and the plight of our planet. An Inconvenient Truth, The Day After Tomorrow, Arctic Tale and Avatar are just a few others. I had a similar reaction to Avatar's environmental message, in part because it's woven into a pantheistic, non-Christian worldview in which taking care of our world is indistinguishable from worshipping it.
So it was with a slight twinge of trepidation that I sat down to watch the new Disneynature documentary Oceans earlier this week. I love watching shows and movies that have to do with nature (my wife and are huge fans of Discovery Channel's Shark Week), but I don't like getting bonked on the head with moralistic, guilt-trip-inducing environmental messages.
Oceans does focus on what we should do for the environment—mostly toward the end. But it doesn't suggest that I'm a bad person if I don't drive a Prius or recycle everything. Nor does it suggest I should be bowing at the altar of Mother Earth. Mostly, in a very sober manner, it suggests that we humans need to recognize that our consumption and waste affect the oceans—and everything living there.
That's a good message. And one, it turns out, that's consistent with what we read about our responsibility to be good stewards of creation as described in the opening pages of Genesis. "God blessed them and said to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground" (Gen. 1:28). A few pages later, Scripture clarifies this responsibility by saying that God put Adam in the Garden of Eden "to work it and take care of it" (Gen. 2:16).
Unfortunately, I suspect a lot of Christians—myself included—often respond with suspicion when it comes to any call to environmental awareness. Perhaps because of movies like Avatar, combined with a constant cultural drumbeat that can treat environmentalism like a religion instead of an important cause, we're tempted to toss out the environmental baby out with the bathwater (which, no doubt, is very polluted anyway).
Yesterday marked the 40th anniversary of Earth Day (and the arrival of Oceans on the big screen and Avatar on video). With that in mind, I want to know how you react to environmental message movies. How does your faith shape the way you do or don't respond to exhortations to be more environmentally responsible? Do some films convict you and inspire you in this area? Or do they just make you mad? Or, maybe, both?
Kids getting sent home from school to change clothes is hardly a new thing. But it's not every day—in fact I don't think I've ever heard a story quite like this one—that an adolescent gets an online shout-out from the rock star who got him into trouble in the first place.
According to MTV News, 15-year-old Cole Goforth was recently told by officials at Tennessee's Greenbriar High School that he needed to find something to wear other than the "I [Heart] Lady Gay Gay" t-shirt he came to school with that day.
Goforth, an openly gay teen, believes he was unfairly discriminated against, and his mother agreed. She told WSMV news in Nashville that the school violated her son's right to free speech. She also noted that other kids regularly wear shirts with messages others might take issue with, be they religious slogans or Confederate flags.
But here's where a fairly familiar story takes an unexpected turn. Lady Gaga herself got wind of the controversy and Twittered about it from the studio and while on tour in Australia. In one tweet, she wrote, "Thank u for wearing your tee-shirt proud at your school, you make me so proud, at the monsterball, you are an inspiration to us all. I love you." Another post reiterated that message: "I love you, Cole, you just be yourself. You're perfect the way God made you."
For their part, school officials say that the decision regarding Goforth's shirt apparently had to do with a similar incident the previous week that led to a fight. If a student's clothing is deemed disruptive, they said, they ask that student to change clothes. "We've had a few disruptions the last few days," said Danny Weeks, assistant director of the school board, "and we thought the slogan on that shirt would continue to escalate those incidents that had occurred."
I think the story got my attention because it combines several of our culture's current hot-button issues—free speech, homosexuality, bullying—and adds a distinctly 21st-century overlay. I mean, I remember kids getting sent home from my high school to change out of problematic Guns N' Roses T-shirts back in the day. But did Axl Rose ever chime in personally to voice his support? Nope. That's a new thing.
More than ever in our culture, celebrities are becoming active participants in discussions like these—to the point of showing their personal, individual approval of fans who support their controversial causes. Given the ubiquity of social networking, I think we can expect to see more stories like this in the future, as Internet-savvy stars like Gaga weigh in on the controversies that they've helped stir up.
Earlier this week I was flipping through local radio stations on the way to work and caught a snippet of conversation on the syndicated morning show Johnjay & Rich. The hosts were talking about Tiger Woods' announcement that he'll begin his post-sex-scandal golf comeback at The Masters in April. Specifically, they were kicking around quotes from Tiger about his own uncertainty regarding how fans would respond when he tees up again.
At that point, one of the guys (I confess I'm not sure which) said something really interesting about a possible response: that fans might welcome Tiger back with open arms and applause.
He pointed to the Charlie Sheen situation. Here's an actor who's been accused of putting a knife to his wife's throat—an act of violence more reprehensible than the sexual shenanigans Tiger allegedly got into. But have those allegations had any effect on the popularity of Sheen's CBS show, Two and a Half Men? Not one bit, if the show's sky-high ratings are any indication. As lurid accusations and allegations regarding Sheen's violent behavior show up in the news, on gossip sites and on tabloid covers, it seems to have had zero impact on his career or his show's popularity.
That observation raised all kinds of questions in my mind. If Two and a Half Men is still the country's top-rated sitcom, does that mean people just don't care about Sheen's actions? Is there a different set of public standards for someone like Sheen, compared to an icon and (now disgraced) role model like Tiger? Why do some stars seem to get penalized in the public eye—Chris Brown's dramatically fading record sales in the wake of his attack on Rihanna offers another recent example—while others, like Sheen, seem to get a free pass?
Perhaps most importantly, what does it say about our culture that sometimes we greet a star's alleged misdeeds with a collective yawn … and then check to see what time his show is on?
Game over.
We still have video games, of course, and digital realms where characters can meet their virtual demise. Nowadays, however, things are a lot more realistic. Fantasy role-playing games render death a lot more realistically—and at times graphically—than anything I encountered back when video games were two-minute, 2-D distractions you paid a quarter for.
For some people, however, video games have become a matter of life and death not only in the pixilated sense, but in the real world as well.
Last week brought news of a couple in South Korea who were so enamored with a virtual world called Prius Online (a screen shot of which is shown here) that they would "play" 12 hours a day—much of that time spent raising a digital baby. The problem? They also had a real baby, one that they neglected, and one that eventually died of malnutrition and dehydration.
The story, tragic and unbelievable as it is, got a lot of press. But one assessment helped me see that this story isn't just about a freak tragedy on the other side of the world. William Saletan, who writes for slate.com, had this to say in his article "Game Over":
But Saletan doesn't leave things there. Instead, he connects the dots between what seems like a dispatch from bizarro world and the world that I live in too.
I may not leave my children alone for 12 hours at a time, but I have been known to ignore a plea for milk or a cracker once or twice because I was absorbed in something online. And in that sense, Saletan's observations here offer a call to wake up and rediscover that the real world will always be more real—and more important—than any of the digital pursuits that tempt us to escape into them from time to time.
Game over, indeed.
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