October 2, 2008

• When some people watch a movie or a TV show, they want to see the characters on screen be idealized people. Those characters get to be, say, and do, what we normal people don't. It's that sense of escapism, where we imagine ourselves as those idealized characters. This is certainly a fine way of watching movies and TV shows, however there's a flip side to that coin. There are some people who prefer to see the characters on screen to be as flawed as normal people can be. The logic there is that it's far easier imagining ourselves in those characters shoes if we can easily relate with them. In a way, the characters still get to be, say, and do, what we normal people don't get to do, but now it's just a bit more closer to home than when they are idealized. That's also a certainly fine way of watching movies and TV shows, but the trick is that it's a balance of the two that really makes it work.

  There are people out there who say that they "don't want to watch flawed characters on screen, because we already get that in real life," and I think they aren't looking at the big picture of the visual story telling art form. When you are watching a movie or TV show based on real life events, do you want those characters to be idealized figures without the flaws of the real life people they are suppose to represent? At the same time though, when you are watching an action thriller, do we really necessarily need our main hero to be an extremely realistic depiction of a person? That's where my emphasis on balancing the two is important, as it's not always good to go any one extreme way. When a movie or TV show takes one extreme side of what their fictional characters should be, they risk alienating a part of their audience who much prefer the other extreme side of the coin.

  Me personally, I do like my characters to be more human like us, as opposed to somebody who is much too idealized. It does make it easier for me to sympathize with the protagonists plight, when I can relate with them a lot more. Put it this way, I think it's easier for people to see themselves as somebody like Batman; who is a normal human working hard to be a super hero, as opposed to somebody like Superman; who is essentially a demi-God.

  So when you are watching a movie or a TV show, think about who you are seeing on screen.  Is the character you are watching too idealized to be believable or too human that it loses it's appeal of escapism? What kind of character do you prefer to lean more towards, when watching movies or TV shows?

  • 9:34 am
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