Heroes and Celebrities

Popular Culture: Movie Series

Heroes

            Heroes are a major part of movies of all kinds. Movies have been created around heroes from the superhero group like Superman, Batman, Cat woman, Wolverine, and X-Men. Heroes can be the person in a movie that saves everyone, or that risks their life for others. In the X-Men series they chronicle the stories of the superheroes from the comics. The amazing thing that each of them can do that makes them not human and how they use that gift to help people. The number of movies that have heroes in them is a list too long to enumerate. People are drawn to movies that give hope or show someone doing something amazing. I believe that as a culture we are drawn to the idea of the hero and want to see someone do things that appear to be beyond human ability.

Celebrity Cult

            Movies created the celebrity cult that we know of today. Many of the celebrities get notoriety because of the movies that they appear in. Depending on the number of movies the celebrity is in determines how popular they are and how much they can make on a film. The more popular they are the more movies they can be in, which adds to their public pull. Some of the biggest celebrities are Bruce Willis, Madonna, Kiss, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Jennifer Anniston, and many more people in the entertainment business. A celebrity does not have to come from the movies, but they are the most nationally known. One can also be a celebrity locally because of business, volunteerism, or local news anchors. All of these different people can be considered a celebrity in their own way.

Rituals and Stereo Types

Popular Culture: Movie Series

Rituals

            Rituals are acts performed by people because of their family of belief system that has been passed down or taught. Some would say that seeing a movie could be considered a ritual. Families that gather and go to see a movie on the night that it is released because of interest in the movie or wanting to be the first to see a movie. Also families around the world sit down to watch movies together on “family night” like a Friday night so that they can spend time with one another. It all depends on who the family is and what their up bringing has taught them to do. In the movie series Twilight Saga being “vegitarian” and only drinking animal blood is a ritual for them, because they belive that drinking from humans is wrong. In the movie series Harry Potter fighting dark magic seems to be a ritual. In the movie series Underworld fighting between vampires and lycans and also the preservation of each species seems to be a ritual. There are many different rituals that have been depicted in movies through out time because we are so facinated by them as a culture.

Stereo Types

            I consider a stereo type to be a preconcieved notion about a person or group of people that is largely judgemental or based on visual, verbal, or incomplete information. Stereo types can be good or bad, but mostly they are negative. In the Twilight Saga vampires are pale, they have extrodinary powers, and they drink blood, but they do not burst into flames when they are out in the sun. This is an example of how that series does not conform to the stereo typical vampire. In the series Harry Potter, Harry is a very unassuming boy, and he does not meet the normal expectations for a hero, who are supposed to be hansome, strong, tall, and attractive? In Harry Potter the bad guys are usally the people that look like heroes, but then again this may just be my stereo type of what a hero is supposed to look like. Movies play to our beliefs and stereo types about people to either prove them true or to challenge what we think is true.

Popular Culture: Beliefs, Myths, and Icons

Popular Culture: Twilight Saga

            The Twilight Saga started out as a series of 4 books about a small town in Washington where supernatural things happened every day. The main supernatural beings in the series are vampires and spirit walkers (werewolves). The local Quileute tribe turn into wolves when there is a threat to the land that the tribe lives on, and that threat is vampires (Meyer). The Cullen’s are a family of 7 vampires that have chosen to live in Forks, WA and try to blend in with the human population (Meyer). The interactions between the town’s people, Quileute’s, and Cullen’s speak too many of the myths and beliefs about vampires and werewolves (Meyer).

Popular Beliefs

            The popular beliefs about vampires and werewolves are far too many to discuss. The main beliefs I am aware of are; vampires suck human blood, burst into flames in the sun light, are pale, and have fangs; werewolves turn into a wolf during the full moon, they are savage beasts, and like eating human flesh. In the Twilight Saga some of these beliefs are not supported because the Cullen’s do not drink human blood they drink animal blood to satisfy their needs and even go as far as to call them self’s “vegetarian” (Meyer). The spirit walkers in Twilight Saga do not eat human flesh and they turn into wolves when ever they need to, so it goes against the popular beliefs. The most significant belief that Twilight contradicts is that vampires burn up in the sun light, because in this series they sparkle like diamonds all over their skin instead of burning up. This out of all of the belief contradictions I think was hardest for people to accept.

Myths

            There are many myths that surround vampires and werewolves. I think that the most popular are that either of these creatures actually existed in this world, they kill humans, and their supernatural abilities like speed or strength. These myths have been perpetuated thru history by recorded documentation of the existence of such things. I find it very hard to believe that this can be all real, but there is always that possibility. The Twilight series contradicts several of those beliefs, but also does support the supernatural abilities that both the Cullen’s and Quileute have speed, strength, and other specialized abilities.

Icons

            Some of the most popular icons of vampires are Dracula, Lestat de Lioncourt from Interview with the Vampire, Blade, Selene from Underworld, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Edward Cullen from Twilight. I believe that there will be many more in the coming years with all of the vampire book series that have become so popular with the younger generation. The most popular werewolf icons are The Wolfman, Teen Wolf, Lycans from Underworld, Jacob from Twilight, and David Kessler from An American Werewolf in London.  I believe that the Twilight Saga has had an impact on many different people and there will forever be Twihards who live for “Team Edward” or “Team Jacob” long after this movie series is over.

Icons

The three icons that I have choosen are: Miranda Lambert, Statue of Liberty, and Twilight Saga.

An icon is what people deem as important or valuable. I choose Miranda Lambert as one of my icons, because I feel that her rise through country music has significantly impacted me and many country music fans. She is an amazing artist and I look forward to watching her career grow over the comming years. I choose the Statue of Liberty, because the statue has been an icon of American freedom for many years. I feel that it truely embodies the American spirit and hope of freedom for all. I choose the Twilight Saga, because I think that it has impacted so many people. It has turned many of the girls and women in the world into Team Edward or Team Jacob. I think that this series will be remembered for a very long time. I believe that icons are the things that interest the large masses of people, and they can be any kind of object, movie, or person.

Hello! Welcome to my Blog

I have chosen my popular culture artifact as the idea of movie series. It seems that there are many movies that have been comming out lately that are based on book series and have become very popular like Harry Potter and Twilight. I think that this is the direct result of our popular culture.