WEBVTT - Occupy Gotham 0:00:01.720 --> 0:00:05.279 Alson Media. 0:00:08.640 --> 0:00:11.600 Welcome to It Could Happen Here, a podcast about stuff 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:13.760 falling apart and how it can maybe come back together. 0:00:14.280 --> 0:00:19.880 I'm Garrison Davis. Joining me today is Mia Wong. Hello. Hello. 0:00:20.960 --> 0:00:23.479 So I don't know what this episode is about. I 0:00:23.520 --> 0:00:26.920 have been told the words David Graeber, and that's that's 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:27.639 that's all I know. 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:34.440 Gra Graber will will come up. So we've we've been 0:00:35.120 --> 0:00:38.000 We've had a lot of you know, upsetting stuff that 0:00:38.000 --> 0:00:40.599 that's been covered on the pod recently. It's it's it's 0:00:40.600 --> 0:00:42.120 not a it's not it's not a great time in 0:00:42.159 --> 0:00:45.040 the world. It's a lot of upsetting things happening. But 0:00:45.640 --> 0:00:49.560 I thought we we might get a small reprieve from 0:00:50.040 --> 0:00:53.360 all of the all of the uh real real world 0:00:53.440 --> 0:00:56.720 chaos and mayhem to talk about some fake world chaos 0:00:56.760 --> 0:01:00.880 and mayhem. And it's also the it's also you know, 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:04.640 it's we are we are vastly approaching the holiday season, 0:01:05.000 --> 0:01:09.200 which means that I I think next week am doing 0:01:09.280 --> 0:01:13.679 my yearly Batman Returns watch party, which I am extremely 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:17.480 excited about. Is it's gonna it's gonna be a fun time, uh, 0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:20.480 which is it's probably it's probably the best Batman movie. 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:25.319 Oh No, it's just about the aesthetics. The aesthetics are unparalleled. 0:01:26.560 --> 0:01:29.319 But I'm discovering what this episode is about. But there 0:01:29.400 --> 0:01:33.759 is another Batman movie that's also set during winter time, 0:01:34.560 --> 0:01:37.399 which is also also very political, because Batman Returns is 0:01:37.400 --> 0:01:41.120 weirdly political. We have the Penguin running for mayor. It 0:01:41.200 --> 0:01:46.840 exposes the the corrupt core of our political system. And 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:49.880 there is another Batman movie, also set during winter that 0:01:50.040 --> 0:01:54.200 tries to expose the corrupt core of the political system, 0:01:54.360 --> 0:01:58.000 which is Christopher Nolans twenty twelve. The Dark Knight Rises, 0:01:58.400 --> 0:02:02.560 a not very good movie which which I think we 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:05.559 have We have referenced before because there's this one essay 0:02:05.680 --> 0:02:09.880 by one David Graber which really gets into the film 0:02:10.000 --> 0:02:12.560 which we're gonna which we're gonna get to. But the 0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:15.200 reason why I actually put together this episode, or I 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:17.200 wanted to do this, is because when I was at 0:02:17.280 --> 0:02:21.200 the Ghost conference earlier this year in Seaside, Oregon, as 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:23.160 you can listen to that two parter which came out 0:02:23.200 --> 0:02:27.959 last Halloween, I got a whole bunch of old magazines 0:02:28.440 --> 0:02:33.040 from this conspiracy talk radio host. Now I love collecting 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:36.960 old magazines. I find them endlessly fascinating. We have this 0:02:37.040 --> 0:02:41.519 one from two thousand and three called MK Zine. Uh 0:02:41.520 --> 0:02:48.040 oh no. On the cover, we have a mind control, 0:02:48.480 --> 0:02:52.639 ritual abuse and political implications, the cult of national insecurity. 0:02:53.120 --> 0:02:55.160 I've not I've not flipped through this one super in 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:58.760 depth before because I'm more taken aback by the other 0:02:58.919 --> 0:03:04.280 magazine I got from twenty twelve called Paranoia the Conspiracy Reader. 0:03:04.880 --> 0:03:09.600 On this cover, we have beyond MK Ultra Satellite Terrorism 0:03:09.639 --> 0:03:15.560 in America, science fiction or space faction. Oh no, and 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:20.280 Dark Knight kill programming, which is obviously the one we're 0:03:20.320 --> 0:03:22.680 going to be talking about here today. No is this 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:26.480 the Sandy thing? No? No, this is this is this 0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:30.280 will briefly get into the Aurora mass shooting because this 0:03:30.360 --> 0:03:32.400 comes up in this in this article. I'm not going 0:03:32.480 --> 0:03:34.600 to get too into that's actually not the focus. 0:03:34.680 --> 0:03:38.320 Yeah, I think I'm realizing, I'm confusing, my you're confusing. 0:03:38.360 --> 0:03:41.640 Your's actually no twelve mass shootings. No, there's that because 0:03:41.640 --> 0:03:46.080 there is actually a Alex Jones conspiracy that there was 0:03:46.120 --> 0:03:49.280 predictive programming in the Dark Knight returns or the Dark 0:03:49.320 --> 0:03:50.000 Knight rises. 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:53.280 That's what this is going to be about. Oh okay, Okay, okay, yes, 0:03:53.880 --> 0:03:56.839 this is by discount Alex Jones, Clyde Lewis, who lives 0:03:56.840 --> 0:04:02.240 in power. Goddamn it. There's there's some pretty fun stuff 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:04.760 in this issue, which we might get to later at 0:04:04.760 --> 0:04:06.880 the end to kind of close out all of our 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:09.480 political mamba jomba that that we will actually get into 0:04:09.520 --> 0:04:12.200 as well. But I want to first look at how 0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:16.240 conspiracy theorists read this movie and how they read the 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.960 political aspects of this movie, because this movie is obviously 0:04:19.040 --> 0:04:21.320 very political if you've seen it, we will we will 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:23.560 get into some of some of the stuff, but I 0:04:24.000 --> 0:04:26.600 want to I want to talk about how these conspiracy 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:29.520 theorists saw this movie because the way that they do 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:33.680 political analysis of media is very different from the way 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:37.560 actual academics and people who take this stuff seriously do 0:04:37.680 --> 0:04:40.000 political analysis of media. And I think there's an interesting 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:44.200 juxtaposition there. So this is this is the cover page 0:04:44.200 --> 0:04:46.960 for this story. The Storm is coming. 0:04:47.200 --> 0:04:53.880 Oh no, no, saves one already off for bands start, yes, yes, 0:04:53.960 --> 0:04:55.800 all right, So I will read a little bit from 0:04:55.800 --> 0:04:57.400 this magazine and then we can kind of talk about 0:04:57.400 --> 0:05:01.359 it and then compare to uh to our our colleague 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:04.600 David Graeber, as I was watching Christopher Nolans The Dark 0:05:04.640 --> 0:05:07.880 Knight Rises, I didn't know the political substance right away, 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:10.200 which is a great way to start. 0:05:09.960 --> 0:05:14.159 This because the film is so obviously political. This this movie, 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:18.040 like the Reeple whoever like this movie like starts with 0:05:18.200 --> 0:05:21.279 Bain literally saying he's going to occupy Wall Street and 0:05:21.440 --> 0:05:22.880 like seizing beflow. 0:05:23.080 --> 0:05:26.159 See this is Wall Street, this, this is this is 0:05:26.160 --> 0:05:30.279 what we will soon be debated. But anyway, I only 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:33.400 saw it as a bit of predictive programming and a 0:05:33.440 --> 0:05:36.880 believable scenario as to how it might all begin. In 0:05:36.920 --> 0:05:40.440 The Dark Knight Rises, Catwoman as Selena Kyle and Batman 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:43.599 as Bruce Wayne are dancing at a socialight gathering when 0:05:43.600 --> 0:05:47.080 Selena purs in his ear. There's a storm coming, mister Wayne. 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:50.880 As it turns out, The Dark Knight Rises is a 0:05:50.960 --> 0:05:54.599 damning indictment of the anti corporate movement and the threat 0:05:54.640 --> 0:05:58.200 of social chaos it poses. Despite rallying people around their 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:01.039 deceased hero Harvey Dent, the rich are losing their grip 0:06:01.040 --> 0:06:04.440 on Gotham City. Antagonist Bain played by Tom Hardy, and 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:07.479 his League of Shadows rise up against the bankers and 0:06:07.520 --> 0:06:10.960 the elite billionaires like Bruce Wayne and attack Wall Street, 0:06:11.320 --> 0:06:14.120 savagely beating the rich while promising the good people of 0:06:14.120 --> 0:06:17.799 Gotham that tomorrow you claim what is right for yours. 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:23.080 Bain's organized violence against the wealthy evokes the reality of 0:06:23.160 --> 0:06:26.599 Occupy Wall Street, but Bain is no Robin Hood. He 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:29.720 is plotting a massive transfer of wealth through stock exchange 0:06:29.960 --> 0:06:33.560 after inciting civil unrest and taking control of cutting age 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:37.080 weapons technologies whose algorithm can be directly traced to Bruce Wayne, 0:06:37.440 --> 0:06:39.840 software which will avail them from the fortunes of the rich. 0:06:40.400 --> 0:06:42.640 As the war between the people and the police in 0:06:42.640 --> 0:06:46.240 the Dark Knight Rises indicates, the predictive programming of statistical 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:49.360 data could very well undermine the one percent and send 0:06:49.400 --> 0:06:52.120 them into the streets where the disgruntled will eat them. 0:06:52.320 --> 0:06:55.880 Fraudulent practices will be exposed, identity theft, credit card fraud, 0:06:55.960 --> 0:06:58.760 securities fraud, and a number of other practices that the 0:06:58.839 --> 0:07:01.640 elite do in order to bilk the poor out of 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:04.560 their money. This is one interesting thing about these sorts 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:08.239 of kind of conspiracy radio guys, how they're both against 0:07:08.240 --> 0:07:12.200 the elite but also fundamentally also for the elite. Like 0:07:12.520 --> 0:07:15.120 this film is celebrated as being you know, like it's 0:07:15.200 --> 0:07:19.400 deriding the anti corporate occupy movement, which they hate because 0:07:19.400 --> 0:07:21.640 they hate they would dislike, you know, a left wing 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:25.880 popular uprising. But in the end they actually prefer this 0:07:26.000 --> 0:07:29.760 corporate like illuminati to the actual alternative. 0:07:30.160 --> 0:07:32.920 Well, and it's it's interesting too, Like the ways that 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:36.920 they think that, like rich people exploit people is through. 0:07:36.760 --> 0:07:40.440 Like credit card fraud is like that, that's how you 0:07:40.480 --> 0:07:43.960 think rich people get rich, Like really, like all right, 0:07:44.000 --> 0:07:47.200 we are almost at the end here. Christopher Nolan's epic 0:07:47.360 --> 0:07:50.840 sounds the alarm of the advent of an organized puppet 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:54.320 master anarchy that plans to topple the government by exposing 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:58.239 and gutting the fortunes of the elite. In real life, 0:07:58.280 --> 0:08:01.000 it might look like an occupy. In this reads sands 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:05.120 and evil drums soundtrack pounding out the perennial battle between 0:08:05.240 --> 0:08:08.320 the haves and the have nots, while the dark Knight 0:08:08.400 --> 0:08:11.720 rises acknowledges the systemic inequality and injustice. It is not 0:08:11.800 --> 0:08:15.720 the rich, but anarchy that is the bane of Gotham's existence. 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:20.239 Get It, Get it on. Nolan portrays the occupy anti 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:23.440 hero bane as a demagogue, ultimately seeking to speculate on 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:27.040 legitimate grievances and when Baine or hands the reigns of 0:08:27.080 --> 0:08:30.000 power over to the people, they really won't know what 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:32.680 to do with it, which is something that never happens 0:08:32.679 --> 0:08:36.120 in the movie. By the way. Oh now this is 0:08:36.480 --> 0:08:39.320 at this point Clyde Lewis stops talking to the movie 0:08:39.600 --> 0:08:44.120 and instead it talks about this bit of predictive programming 0:08:44.280 --> 0:08:46.880 in the movie, which has which has a few kind 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:50.880 of aspects. Then there is the intriguing subplot that seemingly 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:53.199 seeped into reality on the eve of The Dark Knight 0:08:53.280 --> 0:08:56.680 Rise's release, that a software company takes its findings to 0:08:56.720 --> 0:08:59.760 the Supreme Court and exposes so called political heroes which 0:08:59.800 --> 0:09:04.079 would lead to riots and marauding shooters creating mass casualties. 0:09:04.679 --> 0:09:07.400 Imagine that intelligence is aware of the threat and issues 0:09:07.440 --> 0:09:10.200 a declassified memo from the Department of Homeland Security warning 0:09:10.240 --> 0:09:13.760 law enforcement that terrorists could be killing people in movie theaters. 0:09:14.280 --> 0:09:17.199 All that is needed is the catalyzing event, and immediately 0:09:17.440 --> 0:09:21.200 the police estate is activated. Flash riots take place in cities, 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:25.120 civil unrest bruise under the radar. Truth becomes stranger than 0:09:25.120 --> 0:09:27.920 fiction as we examine the media stories surrounding the main 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:31.840 story of the so called brainwashed low nut James Holmes 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.360 opening fire in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, on 0:09:34.440 --> 0:09:39.040 July twenty, twenty twelve, and allegedly killing twelve and injuring 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:43.880 fifty nine others. Interesting use of the word allegedly there 0:09:44.480 --> 0:09:48.400 in regarding regarding the people that were killed. Oh boy. 0:09:48.679 --> 0:09:51.679 And then the next sentence is really where things pick up. 0:09:52.360 --> 0:09:55.880 Not only is James Holmes connected to the neuroscience super 0:09:55.960 --> 0:10:00.520 Soldier Peak Soldier performance experiments, but his fa there works 0:10:00.520 --> 0:10:03.760 for a software company that analyzes fraud. So I'm not 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:05.520 going to actually read the next bit because it is 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:10.959 just the ramblings of conspiracy brained lunatic who thinks that 0:10:11.160 --> 0:10:16.280 because the shooter's dad was a neuroscientist, that therefore his 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:19.440 son must have been this victim of a super soldier 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:23.520 program to brainwash you to activate the police state once 0:10:23.559 --> 0:10:27.400 you receive a bit of predictive programming, and the other 0:10:29.080 --> 0:10:32.080 will I will get to one other paragraph and then 0:10:32.520 --> 0:10:34.520 will be done with this article, because there's really not 0:10:34.640 --> 0:10:39.600 much more substance quote. The chilling predictive programming looming behind 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:42.080 the dark Knight Rises does not escape at least the 0:10:42.240 --> 0:10:46.160 unconscious of those watching. Bain, the leader of the fictional 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:51.640 anarchist mob, decides to plant bombs in the Gotham underground, 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:54.880 the final target being a stadium where the Mayor of 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:58.520 Gotham attends a sports event. A young boy sings the 0:10:58.600 --> 0:11:01.600 national anthem with a British act scent. Bain pauses to 0:11:01.640 --> 0:11:05.640 listen to the distinct voice, then says Nott the gerberge brigand, 0:11:06.400 --> 0:11:09.080 after which the stadium is bombed and the mayor is 0:11:09.200 --> 0:11:16.400 killed in his reserved viewing box. Now, Clyde Lewis believes 0:11:16.400 --> 0:11:19.440 that this was a bit of predictive programming in order 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:22.680 to prepare people for a mash casualty event at the 0:11:22.760 --> 0:11:26.480 London twenty twelve Olympics, which you might you might know 0:11:27.000 --> 0:11:31.120 did not happen. Was not yea was not a thing. 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:33.920 But he is convinced that this is part of some 0:11:33.960 --> 0:11:36.440 predictive programming to either trigger this event, or cover up 0:11:36.520 --> 0:11:39.360 this event, or allude to this event again an event 0:11:39.480 --> 0:11:43.360 that did not happen. So that's you know, as as 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:45.400 as we're going to be talking about, you know, how 0:11:45.559 --> 0:11:49.920 people view mass uprising and political movements in media. For 0:11:49.600 --> 0:11:51.679 the for the rest of this episode. This is how 0:11:51.720 --> 0:11:57.000 a certain sect of conservative does their own media analysis, 0:11:57.000 --> 0:11:58.880 which I think is a really is a really fun, 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:02.880 really fun look into how their brains operate sorting a 0:12:02.960 --> 0:12:07.520 very political film into these into these predictive programming boxes. 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:11.160 But we will we will return to talk about the 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:16.120 Virgin David Graeber and the Chad Mark Fisher. After this 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:31.920 ad break, we are back. I am. I am waiting 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:35.040 watching for the rich to be thrown from their balconies 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:38.160 as wealth as redistributed and a man in a very 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:42.360 fancy coat takes over a sporting event. So I read 0:12:42.840 --> 0:12:47.360 almost every like serious political analysis of the doctment rices 0:12:47.400 --> 0:12:50.959 that I could find from fascists, from conservatives, from liberals, 0:12:51.000 --> 0:12:55.120 and from leftists and anarchists. Everyone agrees that this film 0:12:55.160 --> 0:13:00.719 has some very very obvious occupy parallels. We're going to 0:13:00.760 --> 0:13:02.760 get into how much of those are actually kind of 0:13:02.840 --> 0:13:04.880 built into the film's production versus how much of those 0:13:04.920 --> 0:13:11.200 are more or less coincidental. Now unfortunately for me, not 0:13:11.200 --> 0:13:14.880 actually unfortunately, because I actually do like Graber a lot, 0:13:14.960 --> 0:13:18.320 but his analysis was by far the best out of 0:13:18.480 --> 0:13:23.160 anybody else's in regards to this film. Unfortunately, the UH 0:13:24.600 --> 0:13:28.040 the schizoid, acid fueled chaos magic of Mark Fisher kind 0:13:28.040 --> 0:13:31.359 of paled in comparison to the precision of the anthropologist 0:13:31.440 --> 0:13:34.040 David Graeber in terms of their analysis of this film, 0:13:34.160 --> 0:13:37.040 but both of them had roughly the same opinion. Graber 0:13:37.040 --> 0:13:39.000 has just went into a lot more depth about how 0:13:39.080 --> 0:13:41.840 kind of this film actually politically operates. So I'll be 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:45.680 mostly talking about in quoting from Graber, with a few 0:13:45.720 --> 0:13:48.120 things from Fisher kind of mixed in, and then we'll 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:50.640 compare it to some stuff in Breitbart and The Daily 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:55.680 Caller and a few other reactions from liberals who enjoyed 0:13:55.679 --> 0:13:59.480 the film too much and are are are unwilling to 0:13:59.640 --> 0:14:04.079 kind of seed this conservative ground to Nolan's twenty twelve film. 0:14:04.360 --> 0:14:05.920 And I think this is actually really interesting to talk 0:14:05.960 --> 0:14:08.599 about this film this year after the release of Oppenheimer, 0:14:08.640 --> 0:14:11.760 which I think is Nolan's probably most politically mature work. 0:14:12.360 --> 0:14:14.880 And he has definitely grown a lot in the past 0:14:14.880 --> 0:14:17.400 ten years as a filmmaker, at least in terms of 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:21.680 his ability to get into politics in a way that 0:14:21.760 --> 0:14:25.120 is not just purely reactionary, where I think a lot 0:14:25.600 --> 0:14:29.960 of his early films are kind of absorbed by this reactionariness, 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:32.160 and I think I think he has matured a decent bit, 0:14:32.200 --> 0:14:36.640 at least as as a political filmmaker. So we will 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:42.320 start with a paragraph from Graber quote Christopher Nolan's Batman. 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:44.440 The Dark Knight Rises, not the title of the film 0:14:45.280 --> 0:14:49.280 is really a piece of anti occupy propaganda. Christopher Nolan, 0:14:49.320 --> 0:14:51.360 the director, claims that the script is written before the 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:54.040 movement even started, and that the famous scenes of the 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:57.720 occupation of New York Gotham City were really inspired by 0:14:57.760 --> 0:15:01.160 Dickens's account of the French Revolution. This is probably true, 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:05.200 but it's disingenuous. Everyone knows Hollywood scripts are continually rewritten 0:15:05.240 --> 0:15:07.840 while movies are in production, and when it comes to messaging, 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:10.480 even details like precise wording or where a scene a 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:13.440 shot can make all the difference. Then there's the fact 0:15:13.480 --> 0:15:16.560 that the villains actually do attack the stock Exchange. Still, 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:19.840 it's precisely this ambition, the filmmaker's willingness to take on 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:23.280 the great issues of the day that ruins the movie. 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:29.280 So the script was written well before Occupy started. Shooting 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:32.640 for Dark Knight Rises ended two months after the start 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:35.920 of Occupy. Most of the shooting for the film took 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:39.880 place before Occupy even happened, and now in twenty eleven, 0:15:39.960 --> 0:15:42.400 it was widely misreported that the movie was going to 0:15:42.440 --> 0:15:46.680 be filming at Occupy itself, which started from like I 0:15:46.680 --> 0:15:50.640 think something in the La Times, which just got blown out, 0:15:51.080 --> 0:15:53.400 blown out of proportion. Was not true. They did shoot 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:55.600 in New York, but they did not shoot at Occupy 0:15:55.880 --> 0:16:01.840 yeampubliccause you would have got run out probably Now, leading 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:05.840 up to twenty eleven, both Nolan and what became Occupy 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:09.320 were on very similar conceptual roads. They were just leading 0:16:09.360 --> 0:16:12.000 to two very different places. The Dark Knight released in 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:13.800 the middle of the two thousand and eight financial crisis, 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:16.280 right after the two thousand and eight writers strike ended, 0:16:16.520 --> 0:16:19.360 so there were a lot of class issues circling around 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:22.320 in Nolan's bubble. So it made sense that Nolan's next 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:25.640 Batman flick would tackle these things that rose to cultural 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:28.600 prominence by the time he finished The more Patriot Act 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:32.000 inspired at The Dark Knight. Now, Nolan and other writers 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:36.600 obviously saw economic inequality and corruption seating people's anger and 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:39.360 the rising possibility of civil unrest, and that was put 0:16:39.400 --> 0:16:41.880 into the script and then it just happened two months 0:16:41.880 --> 0:16:45.600 before they finished shooting. Now Nolan also took a lot 0:16:45.720 --> 0:16:48.720 from the Tale of Two Cities. This probably more than 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:50.680 anything else. The Dark Knight rices is actually based on 0:16:50.680 --> 0:16:53.000 the Tale of Two Cities, a passage of which is 0:16:53.120 --> 0:16:55.360 read at the end of the film, And there's plenty 0:16:55.360 --> 0:16:59.600 of parallels to the Front Revolution, including the storming of Bestile. 0:17:00.000 --> 0:17:03.480 Actually two prison breaks inside the Dark Knight rises. There 0:17:03.560 --> 0:17:05.359 is the release of Black Eight, and then there's of 0:17:05.359 --> 0:17:09.359 course when Bruce Wayne escapes the giant hole in the 0:17:09.359 --> 0:17:13.160 ground and frees the other prisoners as well. So still, 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:17.280 throughout all of these kind of class issues that Nolan 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:20.360 is talking about in this film, he still shows a 0:17:20.480 --> 0:17:24.040 deep distrust of populism, or at the very least feared 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:27.040 how easily it could be subverted in a charged financial climate. 0:17:27.359 --> 0:17:30.840 I'm going to read one quote from Fisher here. Quote. 0:17:31.280 --> 0:17:33.920 When Nolan revived the Batman franchise in two thousand and five, 0:17:34.280 --> 0:17:37.240 the setting Gotham in the midst of an economic depression 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:40.359 seemed like an achronistic reference to the superhero's origins in 0:17:40.359 --> 0:17:42.920 the nineteen thirties. Two thousand and eight, the Dark Knight 0:17:43.080 --> 0:17:46.080 was too early to register the impact of the financial crisis, 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:48.639 but the Dark Knight Rises clearly attempts to respond to 0:17:48.640 --> 0:17:51.359 the two thousand and eight situation. The film isn't this 0:17:51.480 --> 0:17:54.600 simple conservative parable that the right wingers would like, But 0:17:54.800 --> 0:17:58.040 in the end it is a reactionary vision, which I 0:17:58.119 --> 0:18:00.760 think is the fairest way to look at this film. 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.280 But now we're going to go deep into into Graber's analysis, 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:07.120 which is by far, probably one of the best write 0:18:07.160 --> 0:18:10.600 ups on twentieth century superheroes and their role in American culture. 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:12.399 It's my it's my favorite by far. This is the 0:18:12.400 --> 0:18:14.320 one that I always like push on people when people 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:15.280 talk about Marvel. 0:18:15.119 --> 0:18:18.080 Because yes, no, absolutely, I mean this is this is 0:18:18.080 --> 0:18:20.679 an essay that you've referenced a lot on this show. 0:18:21.359 --> 0:18:23.320 I've been I've been going into a bit of a 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:27.840 graver resurgence lately. I deeply enjoyed his essay on Puppets, 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:30.399 which I'm going to respond to by writing an essay 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:34.199 on why nihilists hate puppets and except the U and 0:18:34.520 --> 0:18:37.720 accept the adversarial framing of the police. But that is 0:18:37.760 --> 0:18:40.320 a digression. Now we will we will get back to 0:18:40.359 --> 0:18:43.880 Graber's essay in the New Inquiry titled Superposition. 0:18:44.600 --> 0:18:46.439 Oh the thing, the thing I want to mention here 0:18:46.480 --> 0:18:49.879 about this essays he wanted to oh god, what was that? 0:18:50.080 --> 0:18:53.119 He wanted to call it on Batman and the problem 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:55.480 of constituent power, but they wouldn't let him do it. 0:18:55.640 --> 0:18:58.760 So it's well super position instead. This is that is 0:18:58.800 --> 0:19:02.800 certainly what it's actually about, constituent power. We will get 0:19:02.800 --> 0:19:07.560 to that very shortly. So quote. Superheroes are a product 0:19:07.600 --> 0:19:10.920 of their historical origins. Superman is a Depression era displaced 0:19:10.960 --> 0:19:14.160 to Iowa farmboy. Peter Parker, a product of the sixties, 0:19:14.240 --> 0:19:17.399 is a smartass, working class kid from Queens. Batman, the 0:19:17.440 --> 0:19:20.560 billionaire playboy, is the scion of the military industrial complex 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:23.280 that was created just as he was at the beginning 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:27.520 of World War Two. I will say the early origins 0:19:27.520 --> 0:19:29.600 of Batman are far divorced from that, but that is 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:33.959 certainly what Batman has evolved into. Quote. These heroes are 0:19:34.000 --> 0:19:36.920 purely reactionary in a literal sense. They have no projects 0:19:36.960 --> 0:19:39.600 of their own, at least not in their roles as heroes. 0:19:39.920 --> 0:19:43.520 Almost never do superheroes make, create, or build anything. The villains, 0:19:43.520 --> 0:19:47.080 in contrast, are endlessly creative. They are full of plans 0:19:47.080 --> 0:19:50.200 and projects and ideas. Clearly we are supposed to at first, 0:19:50.480 --> 0:19:54.360 without constently realizing it, identify with the villains. After all, 0:19:54.400 --> 0:19:57.119 they're the ones having all the fun. Then, of course 0:19:57.160 --> 0:19:59.879 we feel guilty about it, reidentify with the hero and 0:20:00.119 --> 0:20:03.920 have even more fun watching the super ego clubbing the 0:20:03.920 --> 0:20:07.800 the Errant. It back into submission. This essay that Grab 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:12.200 wrote is very Freudian. Craper makes a lot of freud 0:20:12.240 --> 0:20:15.040 references in this. I'm not gonna be getting into that 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:18.800 as much, but superheroes are also very very Freudian. 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:21.199 Yeah, I want to I want to say one thing 0:20:21.200 --> 0:20:24.200 about this specific passage or specifically the the the way 0:20:24.200 --> 0:20:27.280 that you're encouraged identify with the hero and then like 0:20:27.320 --> 0:20:29.560 that gets like that gets subverted. You're supposed to come 0:20:29.560 --> 0:20:30.120 back to the hero. 0:20:30.720 --> 0:20:32.760 So this used to be a kind of so to 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:35.120 identify with the villain and then yeah, and then come 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:35.960 back back to the era. 0:20:36.119 --> 0:20:38.639 Yeah, so and this is part this works as like 0:20:38.680 --> 0:20:41.480 a conserv ave project of conservative ideology, and this used 0:20:41.480 --> 0:20:44.919 to be like an implicit thing in these movies. And 0:20:44.960 --> 0:20:48.200 then you get to Black Panther, which is literally well 0:20:48.280 --> 0:20:50.560 literally they just like that. That is just the me, 0:20:50.760 --> 0:20:53.200 like like they they stopped being subtle and we're like, hey, 0:20:53.240 --> 0:20:55.119 here's a guy who's an anti imperial list and then 0:20:55.160 --> 0:20:57.160 the ending reveal is, oh my god, he's actually evil. 0:20:57.800 --> 0:21:01.160 In terms of Marvel, I would say, yes, I think 0:21:01.640 --> 0:21:05.080 my two favorite superhero movies, which would be Tim Burton's 0:21:05.080 --> 0:21:08.320 Batman and Batman Returns, do the reverse of this where 0:21:08.560 --> 0:21:11.320 very obviously the villain is the main characters of both 0:21:11.320 --> 0:21:13.760 of those and Batman is really just a side character. 0:21:14.040 --> 0:21:15.840 And I think that was actually work better for this 0:21:15.920 --> 0:21:18.600 medium so much more. Oh yeah, but when it comes 0:21:18.640 --> 0:21:22.240 to Marvel, absolutely, yeah, yeah, they're just like openly doing this. Now. 0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:24.960 It's really sort of like, yeah, it was what the 0:21:25.000 --> 0:21:28.760 second one's about? Two? Yes, yes now. Grayber then talks 0:21:28.760 --> 0:21:32.280 about kind of what the project of these comic books 0:21:32.320 --> 0:21:34.240 were originally supposed to be and how that kind of 0:21:34.280 --> 0:21:39.320 continues on today into pop culture. Quote. Politically speaking, superhero 0:21:39.359 --> 0:21:41.920 comic books can seem pretty innocuous. If all a comic 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:43.560 is trying to do is tell a bunch of adolescent 0:21:43.560 --> 0:21:46.360 boys that everyone has a certain desire for chaos and mayhem, 0:21:46.400 --> 0:21:49.600 but ultimately such desires need to be controlled, the implications 0:21:49.640 --> 0:21:52.480 would not seem especially dire, especially because the message still 0:21:52.480 --> 0:21:55.720 does carry a healthy dose of ambivalence. After all, the 0:21:55.800 --> 0:21:58.720 heroes of even the most rightly ining action movies seem 0:21:58.760 --> 0:22:01.640 to spend much of their time mashing up suburban shopping malls, 0:22:01.640 --> 0:22:03.200 something that many of us would like to do at 0:22:03.200 --> 0:22:05.760 some point in our lives. In the case of most 0:22:05.800 --> 0:22:09.639 comic book superheroes, however, the mayhem has an extremely conservative 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.240 political implication. This is where we can start getting into 0:22:13.480 --> 0:22:17.120 God versus the people and using both of these things 0:22:17.119 --> 0:22:20.240 as constructs. Right, neither of these things really fully exist 0:22:20.280 --> 0:22:22.520 in a super material way. Both of these things are 0:22:22.520 --> 0:22:25.480 constructs quote unquote God, quote unquote the people. They both 0:22:25.520 --> 0:22:29.359 occupy a very similar ontological role, and this is something 0:22:29.359 --> 0:22:33.040 that Graper gets into quote any power capable of creating 0:22:33.040 --> 0:22:35.760 a system of law cannot itself be bound by them. 0:22:36.000 --> 0:22:38.639 In the Middle Ages, the solution was simple. The legal 0:22:38.760 --> 0:22:42.960 order was created either directly or indirectly by God. The English, 0:22:42.960 --> 0:22:47.320 American and French revolutions changed all that when they created 0:22:47.359 --> 0:22:51.000 the notion of popular sovereignty, declaring that the power once 0:22:51.040 --> 0:22:54.399 held by kings and by extension, God, is now held 0:22:54.520 --> 0:22:58.640 by an entity called the people. The people, however, are 0:22:58.760 --> 0:23:01.119 bound by the laws. They are able to create the 0:23:01.240 --> 0:23:05.640