Postmodern media challenges conventional norms, and this essay explores its characteristics and effects using case studies. It challenges conventional norms within mainstream narratives. Presently, these postmodern characteristics pervade nearly all forms of media content.
An example of media content that contains postmodern features is the 2022 Disney+ Marvel Spin-off show She-Hulk, particularly its ninth episode constituting the season finale. Prominent postmodern characteristics evident in this episode encompass self-reflexivity, satire, loss of reality, and parody. To begin, self-reflexivity is prevalent throughout the episode, manifesting in various scenes where the central character (She-Hulk) directly engages with the audience and questions the creative choices made in crafting the episode, openly pondering why the storyline of her final episode appears disjointed. This dialogue with the writers of her show challenges the traditional boundaries of narrative engagement. Moreover, the episode blurs the line between fiction and reality as She-Hulk "breaks the fourth wall," literally traversing the Disney+ home screen and entering Disney's Hollywood studio, engaging in a dispute with the show's creators.
Describe a text, or texts, which are essentially postmodernism.
These are two media texts that I believe are essentially postmodern, these texts are Earth and Keeping Up With The Kardashians. These media texts contains a variety of postmodern features. According to Jean Baudrillard a heightened reality is a form of media that has links to reality, but still has artificial elements that are added in, whereas, a hyper reality is where a media text displays itself as real when it has no connections to reality whatsoever. The first media text is a nature documentary by David Attenborough titled Earth. This documentary can be considered as postmodern as it contains features that can be considered as a heightened reality. This is because it is still in touch with reality as it uses real shots of animals in the documentary, however, this reality is further enhanced by applying effects, soundbites, and commentary. The second media text is reality documentary titled Keeping Up With The Kardashians where the audience is taken to see high-profile celebrity members of the Kardashian-Jenner clan to give an insight into their personal lives and reveal various secrets pertaining to their families and relationships. This media text can be considered as hyper-reality as it contains simulacra, which are things that have lost all meaning or never had any meaning in the first place due to its portrayal in the media over and over again. An example of this is that they put on a persona when there is a camera, using make-up and situations that are scripted to make their lives more appealing. This makes the it difficult for the audience to distinguish between the hyper reality and reality.
- The first part of your P1 about self reflexivity is very good, but then there is nothing else.
ReplyDelete- Be sure to give a short description of what self reflexivity is (and the other features).
- Why is SheHulk criticising her writers postmodern: Because PoMo is a rejection of the status quo and traditional forms of storytelling. She is giving a voice to the audience who might have these opinions and want to voice them. It is a critique on culture, which is exactly what PoMo aims to do.