In the past couple years, the genre of dystopian future has become very popular. Book series like Hunger Games and Divergent, along with countless others, have been huge successes. Dystopian themes have also been present in other movies. First of all, lets lay down the basics of the most recent dystopian films and books. At first it seems like a utopia, mostly peaceful and quiet, the protagonist is different than everyone else and sees what’s wrong with society and rebels against it. They usually join or start a revolutionary group and expose how terrible life actually is to everyone. There are many reasons this genre appeals to everyone.
Especially for teenagers, the idea of one young hero who is the only one that sees through the lies or is different (whether it just seems like it such as Hunger Games, or they for real are the special snow flake like the Giver). I'm a teenager, and I very often feel like I'm the only one that really understands what’s happening and I think this goes for a lot of people around my age (except with me it’s true and everyone else just thinks they are insightful, poor fools.). Next goes for everyone especially people in school, the antagonist is almost always "the system" or government/leader. Everyone likes to feel like a rebel but in the world we live in there is not a lot of opportunity to fight the system. In dystopian fiction there is obvious badness happening where the authorities are concerned. The last thing I'll bring is my main point and what I believe really gets an emotional investment. In most of these movies like Running Man, Hunger Games, or Divergent, the big goal is to show the masses the truth about government badness. The hero of the story like I said earlier sees through the lies but everyone goes along with life. Everyone has had that moment when they spot some injustice, but no one, even their closest friends, care. It is infuriating, frustrating, and it eats away at you. This feeling gets brought out pretty intensely in books like Hunger Games where the whole family can gather round the TV at night to watch their favorite CHILD get MURDERED.
So with all of this in mind you can just a few of the many reasons this genre is so relatable and popular. However, there is one more thing I'd ask you to think about. Obviously these movies and books hold a dark mirror to the world we live in today and what it could become but try to keep this in mind when you enjoy these books. For example, Hunger Games, the obvious answer is how that power structure would arise and control everything but think of the irony with you reading the book. We are getting entertained by these children fighting each other just as much the people being controlled by president Snow. In the Running Man, you would not be very happy if they just talked it out because Arnold fighting some chainsaw Hulk Hogan guy was awesome.
Thanks for reading try to think about the current resemblance to dystopian settings but how the present is similar and what you can learn from that.
So with all of this in mind you can just a few of the many reasons this genre is so relatable and popular. However, there is one more thing I'd ask you to think about. Obviously these movies and books hold a dark mirror to the world we live in today and what it could become but try to keep this in mind when you enjoy these books. For example, Hunger Games, the obvious answer is how that power structure would arise and control everything but think of the irony with you reading the book. We are getting entertained by these children fighting each other just as much the people being controlled by president Snow. In the Running Man, you would not be very happy if they just talked it out because Arnold fighting some chainsaw Hulk Hogan guy was awesome.
Thanks for reading try to think about the current resemblance to dystopian settings but how the present is similar and what you can learn from that.