Aug 4

Aug 4 My problem

So Dave says that not only am I a sociopath but I am also ungrateful because I didn't go nuts over Guardians of the Galaxy like other people on the internet seemed to. That's not to say that I didn't enjoy it -- There were many parts that appealed to me. I just didn't get an overwhelming sense of JOY and/or FUN that everyone else seemed to until midway through. It took me a minute or 30 to get there.

Dave's hypothesis is that since I was too young to have seen Star Wars in the theater, I can't feel the same type of nostalgia for a quirky space opera like Guardians. And also, I suck.

We attempted to figure out what a similar serialized "genre" feature would have been for my age group, and I offered up Back to the Future. True, I was too young to have seen it at the theater, since I was in preschool at the time of its release... but my family and I watched it over and over again on VHS and cable, which meant that by the time Part Two was released in 1989, I was pumped up and ready. It did not disappoint.

Where was I going with this? Oh yeah, I hate life and all happy things if I can't enjoy Guardians of the Galaxy as much as I enjoyed the Back to the Future movies.

Frankly, I think I just have a problem identifying with and experiencing nostalgia for characters who aren't like myself. The Marty McFlys and Peter Venkmans of the world were far more interesting to me than the Indiana Joneses and Bruce Waynes. The former were workaday schmoes who happened into extraordinary circumstances. (Well, in the case of Dr. Venkman, he'd structured his career around the extraordinary.) The latter were incredibly gifted, sometimes super-powered heroes who could rely on their prior experience and skills to save the day. I could see myself in the everyday guys fumbling their way through an extreme situation more so than in the nearly-infallible superheroes and adventurers, so I enjoyed the McFlys and Venkmans more.

Is this mindset a by-product of raging narcissism? Perhaps. Is it also extremely hypocritical, given my stated ambivalence towards The Goonies and E.T. which also feature regular Joes in extraordinary circumstances? Yes, definitely. But I am entitled to this opinion, and I am curious to see how we'll look back on this movie era wherein there seems to be a lack of everyday people saving the world.