tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/stranger-things-34449/articlesStranger Things – The Conversation2023-04-18T01:22:59Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2035522023-04-18T01:22:59Z2023-04-18T01:22:59ZFrom the basement to the big screen: how Dungeons & Dragons evolved from a game to a multi-media franchise<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/521191/original/file-20230417-4080-3nywlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=50%2C5%2C1940%2C988&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">IMDB</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Death, dramatic diversions and dark wizards: the new Dungeons & Dragons film successfully adapts aspects of the famous tabletop game of the same name to the big screen.</p>
<p>Making <a href="https://variety.com/2023/film/news/box-office-dungeons-and-dragons-40-million-opening-weekend-1235570970/">US$71 million (A$106 million) globally</a> and taking out the top box office spot during its opening weekend, <a href="https://www.dungeonsanddragons.movie/home/">Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves</a> is a film that follows a group of thieves who must choose between heroism and riches in order to topple an evil sorceress.</p>
<p>The film is one of the latest examples of a largely <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/23671209/dungeons-dragons-honor-among-thieves-movie-game">well-received</a> game adaptation. It knows which parts of the game are best portrayed through the film medium – sprawling fantasy landscapes and visual depictions of magic and monsters. It also knows which parts are best left out for film audiences, such as continual dice rolls and extended meta-narratives.</p>
<p>Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is a great example of why the storytelling world of Dungeons & Dragons has persisted and thrived for so many years: its adaptability to a broad range of different mediums and styles of narrative.</p>
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<h2>What is Dungeons & Dragons?</h2>
<p>Originally published in 1974, <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/">Dungeons & Dragons</a> (also colloquially known as D&D) is a tabletop role-playing game where groups of players meet to role-play characters, fight monsters and play make-believe with their friends – usually using dice rolls to decide how things play out.</p>
<p>Though traditionally played over a physical tabletop, <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/13/dungeons-dragons-had-its-biggest-year-despite-the-coronavirus.html">online D&D play</a> has become more commonplace and is an accessible alternative for players who can’t participate in person.</p>
<p>Historically, Dungeons & Dragons was often viewed as a complex high fantasy hobby and was <a href="https://theconversation.com/rival-fantasies-dungeons-and-dragons-players-and-their-religious-critics-actually-have-a-lot-in-common-40343">stigmatised</a> when it became associated with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/satanic-worship-sodomy-and-even-murder-how-stranger-things-revived-the-american-satanic-panic-of-the-80s-186292">Satanic Panic</a> of the 1980s. This association began when unproven claims linked the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26328105">death of two teenagers</a> back to their Dungeons & Dragons play. </p>
<p>However, the game’s reputation, rules and player base have evolved since then, and it is experiencing a modern resurgence in play and popularity.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/satanic-worship-sodomy-and-even-murder-how-stranger-things-revived-the-american-satanic-panic-of-the-80s-186292">'Satanic worship, sodomy and even murder': how Stranger Things revived the American satanic panic of the 80s</a>
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<p>Even though there are official published rulebooks that help guide play, Dungeons & Dragons publishers have consistently emphasised the importance of imagination and collaboration. They have encouraged players to cater their games to their own interests by developing rules that allow for <a href="https://comicbook.com/gaming/news/dungeons-dragons-wild-beyond-witchlight-new-details/">various types of gameplay to be valid</a>. The most recent edition of the <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/products/rpg_playershandbook">player’s handbook</a> even states: </p>
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<p>D&D is your personal corner of the universe, a place where you have free reign to do as you wish […] Read the rules of the game and the story of its worlds, but always remember that you are the one who brings them to life. They are nothing without the spark of life that you give them.</p>
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<span class="caption">A tabletop game of Dungeons & Dragons.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<h2>The modern trend of transmedia storytelling</h2>
<p>In his book on <a href="https://nyupress.org/9780814742952/convergence-culture/">convergence culture</a>, media scholar Henry Jenkins describes “transmedia storytelling” as the act of telling a story across multiple formats.</p>
<p>At a time where we are consuming larger volumes of content across various digital and non-digital platforms, transmedia storytelling offers audiences multiple points of entry into media properties based on their own preferences. Beyond the strong financial motives, transmedia storytelling also delivers content to audiences that may not have been targeted or interested otherwise.</p>
<p>Dungeons & Dragons has been widely adapted over the years and many of these representations have directed greater interest and attention towards the original game.</p>
<p>Although the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_%26_Dragons_(TV_series)">animated TV series</a> from the early 1980s and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_%26_Dragons_(film_series)">original trilogy of Dungeons & Dragons films</a> from the 2000s were met with critical reviews, both adaptations lean into the strong visual affinities of their respective mediums.</p>
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<span class="caption">The Dungeons & Dragons animated series from 1983 focuses on a group of six friends from Earth who are transported into the realm of Dungeons & Dragons.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">IMDB</span></span>
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<p>This can also be seen in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Record_of_Lodoss_War">The Record of Lodoss War</a>. The independently created series originated as a published campaign log of a Japanese Dungeons & Dragons game. It has since evolved into a multi-media franchise which includes manga, animation and video game adaptations.</p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actual_play">Actual-play</a> is a term that is used to describe how people play tabletop role-playing games like D&D for audiences. It’s growing into one of the most popular types of content for live-streaming and podcast media. </p>
<p>Notable and popular examples of actual-play D&D adaptations include <a href="https://maximumfun.org/podcasts/adventure-zone/">The Adventure Zone</a>, <a href="https://critrole.com/shows/critical-role/">Critical Role</a>, <a href="https://www.dropout.tv/dimension-20">Dimension 20</a> and <a href="https://thedragonfriends.com/">The Dragon Friends</a>. The stories told can range from classic Dungeons & Dragons campaigns to unique and adapted stories that simply use the rule system.</p>
<p>Though they vary in genre, run time and production methods, these actual-play representations of Dungeons & Dragons games appeal to audiences that are interested in the players and play of Dungeons & Dragons, just as much as the stories, characters or worlds that are explored.</p>
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<h2>Dungeons & Dragons in popular culture</h2>
<p>In addition to the game’s fantasy worlds and gameplay dynamics, Dungeons & Dragons’ capacity for social connection and personal growth has also been covered in <a href="https://analoggamestudies.org/byline/alex-chalk/">popular culture and media</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.netflix.com/au/title/80057281">Stranger Things</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freaks_and_Geeks">Freaks and Geeks</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_(TV_series)">Community</a> are just some examples of how popular media has successfully incorporated the social dynamics of Dungeons & Dragons play. </p>
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<p>Characters within these shows use the game to develop skills to overcome various challenges or connect with others. <a href="http://www.digra.org/wp-content/uploads/digital-library/DiGRA_2020_paper_223.pdf">Research</a> has indicated that representations of Dungeons & Dragons in popular culture have helped reshape perceptions of the game and have likely played a part in the game’s modern resurgence.</p>
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<span class="caption">Dungeons & Dragons game depicted in Netflix’s Stranger Things.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span>
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<h2>The continued importance of D&D’s open gaming license</h2>
<p>Dungeons & Dragons content and media is not <a href="https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/who-owns-dungeons-dragons/">solely created or distributed by the game’s official publishers</a>. Since 2000, the game’s <a href="https://media.wizards.com/2016/downloads/SRD-OGL_V1.1.pdf">open gaming license</a> (known as the OGL) has let audiences create content that is compatible with some of the game’s core mechanics. </p>
<p>However, the longevity of original and independently created content was put into jeopardy <a href="https://theconversation.com/content-creators-and-corporations-clash-in-dungeons-and-dragons-licensing-fiasco-199169">earlier this year</a> when a new version of the license was proposed. This version of the OGL was perceived to be more restrictive and anti-competitive than the initial version, leaving the future of Dungeons & Dragons adaptations unknown.</p>
<p>What we do know is that Dungeons & Dragons is experiencing a resurgence in play and popularity because it’s able to leverage the way audiences currently consume content: across multiple forms and through diverse narratives.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203552/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Premeet Sidhu is a recipient of the NSW Education Waratah Scholarship.</span></em></p>Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is a great example of why the storytelling world of Dungeons & Dragons has persisted and thrived for so many years.Premeet Sidhu, PhD Student in Media and Communications, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1863892022-07-10T20:27:27Z2022-07-10T20:27:27ZIt’s not nostalgia. Stranger Things is fuelling a pseudo-nostalgia of the 1980s<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472932/original/file-20220707-23-7ba1ld.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C0%2C7018%2C3509&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The 1980s are back, and nowhere more so than in the nostalgia-filled season four of Stranger Things.</p>
<p>Kate Bush’s Running up that Hill is the current number-one hit <a href="https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZEVXbMDoHDwVN2tF?si=3e8172fa2d8f4ab7">on Spotify</a>. Since Stranger Things’ season finale, Metallica’s Master of Puppets has joined Bush at the top of the charts.</p>
<p>Mullets are making a comeback. Billy Hargrove (played by Perth’s Dacre Montgomery) has been rocking the hairstyle, as have Miley Cyrus and Little Mix’s Leigh-Anne Pinnock. The famed 1980s banana hair clip is back, as well as the perm(anent wave) which Nancy (Natalia Dyer) and Karen Wheeler (Cara Buono) sport this season.</p>
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<span class="caption">Dacre Montgomery as Billy in Stranger Things.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span>
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<p>A key feature of contemporary marketing is the development of products and services that feature a new theme on an old idea. Called “<a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/30040534">retromarketing</a>”, it is the relaunch or revival of a product or service from a historical period, which marketers usually update to ultramodern standards of functioning, performance or taste.</p>
<p>Sure, nostalgia sells – but what retromarketers really try to induce are feelings of “pseudo-nostalgia”. </p>
<p>We call it pseudo-nostalgia because younger consumers of these revived products and services have never experienced the original. Generation Z will not have been there, done that. </p>
<p>In fact, they are buying retrotastic products and services that sometimes have little relation to 1980s reality whatsoever.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ethereal-evocative-and-inventive-why-the-music-of-kate-bush-spans-generations-184571">Ethereal, evocative, and inventive: why the music of Kate Bush spans generations</a>
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<h2>More of the 1980s</h2>
<p>Stranger Things costume designer Amy Parris and her team have collaborated with Quiksilver on five apparel collections <a href="https://press.dxd.agency/188580-quiksilver-launches-apparel-collection-based-on-netflix-original-series-stranger-things-4">based on 1980s fashion</a>. Founded in Torquay, the surf-inspired clothing brand was an integral part of the eighties look. </p>
<p>It’s not only Stranger Things harking back to the 1980s. Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021) not only brought back the much-loved movies, but also recreated the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man as “Mini-Pufts” for a new set of consumers.</p>
<p>Thor: Love and Thunder also has a distinct eighties-adventure vibe, taking the Beastmaster (1982), Conan the Barbarian (1982) and eighties Californian graffiti as visual inspiration to great effect and amusement.</p>
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<h2>Playing the part</h2>
<p>Of course, Generation Z, born after 1996, cannot actually be nostalgic for the 1980s.</p>
<p>As young consumers become pseudo-nostalgic for the 1980s, they look to evoke that decade through “compensatory reconsumption”: they immerse themselves in eighties pop culture to cope with their wistful affection and sentimental longing for this period of the past. Consuming 1980s-esque products and services allows them to pretend they were really a part of that historical period.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/satanic-worship-sodomy-and-even-murder-how-stranger-things-revived-the-american-satanic-panic-of-the-80s-186292">'Satanic worship, sodomy and even murder': how Stranger Things revived the American satanic panic of the 80s</a>
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<p>For fans of Stranger Things, buying retrotastic products and services helps fans go to the 1980s in their mind’s eye and empathise with their beloved characters. </p>
<p>This recreation of the eighties leads to a transformation of the decade itself. </p>
<p>TV series and movies like Stranger Things, Ghostbusters and Thor transform consumers’ relationship with the historical time. As one person <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jcr/ucac022">we interviewed</a> put it:</p>
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<p>The original canon is not immune to what I have lived. It is no longer possible to distinguish between what you live […] from what you [see] in the original.</p>
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<p>To put it another way, when zoomers feel nostalgic for the 1980s, they play at being a part of that decade. They see themselves as experts with an authentic understanding of the historical period and its associations.</p>
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<h2>Painful memories or something new to love?</h2>
<p>It isn’t all mullets and pop songs.</p>
<p>The 1980s were also the height of the Trabant car, the national car of the German Democratic Republic in the days before the fall of the Berlin Wall.</p>
<p>The laughing stock of Europe, the “Trabi” was a small but sturdy car that could barely muster 100 kilometres per hour. Due to the communist planned economy, it could take more than ten years after ordering to finally take delivery of the car.</p>
<p>So, it may be a bit of a surprise that an electric Trabant nT or “<a href="http://www.trabant-nt.de/367/en/home.aspx">newTrabi</a>” has been unveiled as a concept car. Better equipped than the old Trabi, in true capitalist style it would come with all the mod cons. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A yellow Trabant" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473130/original/file-20220708-12-ma2sh0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Is the Trabant really a car we want to bring back?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Is the association with the old Trabi too comic or painful? Or will drivers love the newTrabi as a symbol of where East Germany started and how far it has come?</p>
<p>If Quiksilver’s collections are any sign, drivers will love the newTrabi. Even just a year ago, it was hard to imagine neon or oversized clothing ever coming back into fashion – but now the Quiksilver/Stranger Things collaboration has seen a <a href="https://www.quiksilver.com.au/quiksilver-x-stranger-things-lenora-hills-strapback-hat-3613377975344.html">neon purple hat</a> and this pastel mishmash of a <a href="https://www.quiksilver.com.au/quiksilver-x-stranger-things-womens-lenora-windbreaker-jacket-EQWJK03077.html">nylon oversized windbreaker</a> sell out worldwide.</p>
<p>The 1980s are back – but it is worth remembering these are not the true 1980s. No matter how great the fashion faux pas, consumers who embrace the current 1980s revival will go to that time through pseudo-nostalgia and compensatory reconsumption.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/186389/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Mullets, perms and neon clothes are all back – but Gen Z can’t be nostalgic for an era they never experienced.Tom van Laer, Associate Professor of Narratology, University of SydneyDavide Christian Orazi, Senior lecturer, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1865362022-07-10T12:48:14Z2022-07-10T12:48:14Z‘Stranger Things’ shows how conspiracy theories take hold and do harm<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473083/original/file-20220707-26-gb1vag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1043%2C517&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A conspiracy theory is formed against Stranger Things character Eddie Munson.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Stranger Things/Netflix)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/-stranger-things--shows-how-conspiracy-theories-take-hold-and-do-harm" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p><em>Note: The following article contains spoilers about “Stranger Things.”</em></p>
<p><em>Stranger Things’</em> most recent season, which <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/entertainment/netflix-says-stranger-things-sets-new-viewing-milestones-1.5975276">set Netflix viewership milestones</a> and had an estimated budget of <a href="https://sea.ign.com/stranger-things/184610/news/stranger-things-season-4-reportedly-has-a-per-episode-cost-of-30-million">$30 million per episode</a>, has a subplot focused around a famed conspiracy of satanism tied to children playing <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26328105">Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) in the 1980s</a>. And it’s one that does a pretty good job mirroring the issues society has with conspiracy theory today.</p>
<p>On the same weekend of the release of the Season Four finale of <em>Stranger Things</em>, the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/mendicino-canada-day-emergencies-act-1.6500411">so-called “freedom convoy” returned to Canada’s capital</a> reminding us of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/08/canada-ottawa-trucker-protest-extremist-qanon-neo-nazi">conspiracy-fuelled event from February</a>.</p>
<p><em>Stranger Things’</em> conspiracy leanings point out how easily influenced people can be when they are clamouring for answers during times of uncertainty, and how in order to move forward people must be open to challenging their perspectives.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sBEvEcpnG7k?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Trailer for <em>Stranger Things 4</em>, Volume 2 on Netflix.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>From Hellfire to pandemic pandemonium</h2>
<p>In <em>Stranger Things</em> the conspiracy theory sub-narrative revolves around high school basketball team captain Jason Carver. Jason’s girlfriend, Chrissy Cunningham, is murdered by the show’s villain (Vecna) but he, the town and its police force focus their investigation on drug dealer and leader of the Hellfire DnD club, Eddie Munson. Jason mobilizes the town to hunt down members of the club who he believes have become servants of the devil. </p>
<p>Conspiracy theories emerge <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002%2Fejsp.2530">from people trying to find answers</a>. In <em>Stranger Things</em>, Jason had questions about Chrissy’s death. To him, she was the perfect cheerleader who would never use drugs, so when she was found in Eddie’s home, Jason connected the dots himself to stories <a href="https://www.dicebreaker.com/games/dungeons-and-dragons-5e/feature/dnd-satanic-panic">that spoke about DnD and satanism</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man in a high school jacket stands in front of a crowd" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=275&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=275&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=275&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473096/original/file-20220707-16-17gppu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jason Carver spun a web of conspiracies in an attempt to find answers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU0na2bTcaM">(Netflix via SiimplyRose/YouTube)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In a progression of truth that seems all to familiar, Jason <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Strategic-Conspiracy-Narratives-A-Semiotic-Approach/Madisson-Ventsel/p/book/9780367540890">built his own narrative</a>. He took a small amount of truth (where Chrissy was found), coupled with his beliefs (Chrissy wouldn’t do drugs) and went on a crusade that harmed his town and some people in it.</p>
<p>Something similar happened at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic when there were a lot of unknowns. <a href="https://theconversation.com/conspiracy-theories-about-the-pandemic-are-spreading-offline-as-well-as-through-social-media-167418">People wanted answers</a> and experts were scrambling to learn and explain things quickly, causing facts to be coupled with people’s opinions, pushing us <a href="https://www.who.int/health-topics/infodemic#tab=tab_1">into an infodemic</a>. </p>
<p>Information was disjointed, opinions were everywhere and, like Jason, people were connecting their own dots to form conclusions. As <a href="https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/how-origins-covid-19-became-politicized">politics</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s42001-020-00086-5">worldviews and conspiracy intertwined with facts</a>, false narratives developed saying <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2021/06/microchipped-vaccines-15-minute-investigation/619081/">vaccines are microchipped</a> or the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/55017002">pandemic was orchestrated by a cabal of global leaders</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A group of people crowd a table as one person reads." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=299&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=299&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=299&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473085/original/file-20220707-18-43mygb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Eddie Munson, the Dungeon Master, reads from a playbook in the campaign for his life.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/stranger-things-season-4-volume-2-photos">(Stranger Things/Netflix)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Like Jason, people were coming to conclusions based on <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/10/24/132228/political-war-memes-disinformation/">opinion, belief and little kernels of truth</a>. We see this in all conspiracy theories, and this becomes a serious problem <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/qanon-expert-joesph-uscinski-1242636/">when communities form, or leaders emerge like Jason</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108990936">taking these ideas and acting on them</a>. </p>
<p><em>Stranger Things</em> and Jason’s quest reminds us that our interpretation of the world, or perspective, is <a href="https://thenewpress.com/books/strangers-their-own-land">central to our understanding of what we believe in</a>.</p>
<h2>The danger of perspective</h2>
<p>How people are raised, what they’re taught, who they are and the experiences they’ve had all inform their perspective. This can be great, it can drive people to debate, question things and further a collective understanding. But if <a href="https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/understanding-our-polarized-political-landscape-requires-a-long-deep-look-at-our-worldviews/">people’s perspectives become too polarized and they are unwilling to be challenged, they can become problematic</a> and disruptive to the safety and health of those around them.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/humans-are-hardwired-to-dismiss-facts-that-dont-fit-their-worldview-127168">Humans are hardwired to dismiss facts that don't fit their worldview</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Many people draw lines in the sand when it comes to what they believe. If a narrative doesn’t fit their worldview, it’s deemed untrue, worth ignoring and sometimes re-framed entirely. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Five people stand looking forward" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473086/original/file-20220707-20-frr26z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Hellfire club was made out to be the culprit, centre to a local conspiracy theory.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/stranger-things-season-4-volume-2-photos">(Stranger Things/Netflix)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Jason was just looking for an answer. He used the knowledge and tools he had to come up with one that seemed to make sense. The problem was that even when confronted with alternate facts, Jason refused to challenge his perspective. </p>
<p>His <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00206">conspiracy was birthed from emotion</a>. He was grieving and his sadness and rage clouded his understanding. Emotions can make it even harder to have an open mind when it comes to challenging one’s own perspectives. </p>
<p>Conspiracy isn’t just something on TV; it’s running rampant in our society. A recent study showed that <a href="https://abacusdata.ca/conspiracy-theories-canada/">44 per cent of Canadians believe in conspiracy theories</a>. If almost half the population believes in disinformation or something conspiratorial, we must challenge their perspectives, broaden their worldviews and encourage them to move past emotional responses. </p>
<p>People are immersed in <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/swarm">a constant flow of information</a>. Information might look harmless, but be part of an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/25/world/europe/disinformation-social-media.html">entire industry of fake information production</a>. It’s important people assess where their information is coming from. Broadening sources will help ensure society stays free of an infodemic.</p>
<p>Before pulling a Jason and going full crusader for a worldview, let’s question the stranger things in life and seek to learn from them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/186536/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Scott DeJong receives funding from Fonds de Recherche du Québec - Société et Culture.. </span></em></p>Season Four of ‘Stranger Things’ shows how easily people are influenced when they’re clamouring for answers during times of uncertainty.Scott DeJong, PhD Candidate and Research Assistant, Communication Studies, Concordia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1862922022-07-04T20:00:34Z2022-07-04T20:00:34Z‘Satanic worship, sodomy and even murder’: how Stranger Things revived the American satanic panic of the 80s<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472192/original/file-20220703-13-mu2ab6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C6%2C4500%2C2977&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>From Kate Bush to Russian villainy, Season Four of Stranger Things revives many parts of the 1980s relevant to our times. Some of these blasts from the past provide welcome nostalgia. Others are like unwanted ghosts that will not go away. The American Satanic Panic of the 1980s is one of these less welcome but important callbacks.</p>
<p>In Stranger Things season four, some residents of the all-American but cursed town of Hawkins hunt down the show’s cast of heroic misfits after labelling them as satanic cultists. The satanism accusation revolves around the game Dungeons and Dragons and the protagonists’ meetings to play it with other unpopular students at their high school as part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/pornography-the-devil-and-baboons-in-fancy-dress-what-went-on-at-the-infamous-historical-hellfire-club-185869">Hellfire Club</a>. </p>
<p>Mistaking a harmless game played by a pack of nerds for a satanic conspiracy, the athletic and popular Jason Carver wrongly blames its players for the very real supernatural horrors at the heart of the plot.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472204/original/file-20220704-22-yozi0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Eddie Munson in Stranger Things is at the centre of a satanic panic in season four.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Satanic worship, sodomy, suicide, and even murder!</h2>
<p>The false link in the show between Dungeons and Dragons and an occult conspiracy is based on real history. In the 1980s, TV pundits, politicians, and religious leaders really <a href="http://www.theescapist.com/darkdungeons.htm">thought the game</a> was an entry point to satanic worship and an imagined vast conspiracy of satanic cults that supposedly permeated the United States and the entire world. </p>
<p>In the first episode, Eddie, the leader of the Hellfire Club and its Dungeons and Dragons game, derisively recites absurd <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26328105">accusations made at the time</a>. These panicked allegations suggested Dungeons and Dragons promoted “satanic worship, sodomy, suicide, and even… murder!” During the season, Eddie himself becomes the victim of similar accusations.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pornography-the-devil-and-baboons-in-fancy-dress-what-went-on-at-the-infamous-historical-hellfire-club-185869">Pornography, the devil and baboons in fancy dress: what went on at the infamous historical Hellfire Club</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Occult rituals, orgies and human sacrifices</h2>
<p>The campaign against Dungeons and Dragons was part of a larger hysteria about a supposed enormous conspiracy, frequently called today the <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/22358153/satanic-panic-ritual-abuse-history-conspiracy-theories-explained">Satanic Panic</a>. </p>
<p>Central to it was the idea that networks of cults were conducting occult rituals, orgies, and human sacrifices, involving the abuse and murder of children. This ritual abuse was similar to the claims made in an influential but discredited book, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelle_Remembers">Michelle Remembers</a> (1980). </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=886&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=886&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=886&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1113&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1113&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472206/original/file-20220704-13-yatb1b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1113&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Michelle Remembers written by Lawrence Pazder & Michelle Smith.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikipedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Stories like Michelle Remembers popularised the idea of large, inter-generational satanic networks that were taking down American society from inside. Specialists <a href="https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2008.00169.x">tie</a> the proliferation of belief in this conspiracy to anxieties resulting from accelerating social changes. </p>
<p>These included women surging into the workforce, increasingly sensationalised crime reporting, the “decay” of traditional values, and the rise of the religious right in America.</p>
<h2>An atmosphere of panic</h2>
<p>Belief in satanic conspiracy during the 1980s and 1990s destroyed many lives. Especially in North America, there were hundreds of accusations that resulted in numerous trials. Recent <a href="https://www.publicaffairsbooks.com/titles/richard-beck/we-believe-the-children/9781610392877/#:%7E:text=A%20brilliant%2C%20disturbing%20portrait%20of,for%20the%20safety%20of%20children.">books</a> and <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/472-satanic-panic">podcasts</a> explore specific cases such as Martensville, Saskatchewan or the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/100000002755079/mcmartin-preschool-anatomy-of-a-panic.html">McMartin Preschool</a> near Los Angeles. </p>
<p>At McMartin, it was alleged that hundreds of children had been sexually abused at underground orgies. Even in an atmosphere of panic, the evidence was insufficient to secure any convictions. </p>
<p>Accusations elsewhere frequently tried credulity, suggesting the murder of preposterous numbers of children and infants. These claims were false. For example, a <a href="https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/Digitization/154415NCJRS.pdf">1994 study</a> examined 12,000 accusations of organised satanic ritual abuse. It concluded there was no evidence for organised satanic cults that sexually abuse children. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/472209/original/file-20220704-20-us5aus.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">At McMartin, it was alleged that hundreds of children had been sexually abused at underground rituals.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Studies of specific accusations, such as at McMartin, often emphasise how adult investigators created accounts of abuse that fit their preconceptions of satanism. They did it, often unknowingly, by getting suggestible children to say what they expected to hear.</p>
<p>The models of ritual abuse investigators reproduced have a history. Early modern witch hunts are one frequently cited analogue, but the similarities run much deeper and <a href="https://www.publicmedievalist.com/pizzagate-cults/">further back</a> in time. The secret meetings, orgies, and ritual abuse attributed to modern cults correspond to what Norman Cohn <a href="https://www.penguin.com.au/books/europes-inner-demons-9780712657570">called</a> the nocturnal ritual fantasy. Similar, accusations were made against witches, Christian heretics, Jews, and early Christians. </p>
<h2>Satanic panic today</h2>
<p>As author David Frankfurter <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691136295/evil-incarnate">suggests,</a> the many different versions of supposed demonic conspiracies display patterns. One of the most worrisome and ironic is that historically verifiable atrocities take place not at the hands of non-existent cults – but rather during mistaken attempts to destroy them. </p>
<p>One atrocity is the minimisation of the real abuse of children. By tying it to imagined conspiracies, delusions like the Satanic Panic <a href="https://www.iuniverse.com/BookStore/BookDetails/113535-Satan-s-Silence">avoid</a> grappling with the actual social structures that facilitate abuse.</p>
<p>The Satanic Panic, or demonic occult conspiracy theory, is still with us. Actually, it has taken on new forms, as part of <a href="https://www.amazon.com.au/Republic-Lies-Conspiracy-Theorists-Surprising/dp/1250159059">Pizzagate</a> or <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/676746/the-storm-is-upon-us-by-mike-rothschild/">QAnon</a>. Believers of both conspiracies frequently allege that their social and political enemies ritually abuse children following ancient tropes of cult evil. </p>
<p>As in the past, such accusations can justify violence ironically performed in the name of eradicating evil. Belief in discredited, but familiar, demonic conspiracies makes it likely this familiar mistake will happen again.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/186292/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael David Barbezat does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The latest season of Stranger Things features a town in the grip of a ‘Satanic Panic’. This reflects the very fears that existed in 1980s America, which still exist in different forms today.Michael David Barbezat, Research fellow, Australian Catholic UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1858692022-06-30T19:49:54Z2022-06-30T19:49:54ZPornography, the devil and baboons in fancy dress: what went on at the infamous historical Hellfire Club<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471743/original/file-20220630-22-d326lh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C5%2C3817%2C1908&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>After a month of waiting, the season finale of <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4574334/">Stranger Things season 4</a> has almost arrived on Netflix. This season, along with the nightmarish arch-villain Vecna, we have been introduced to “the Hellfire Club” – the <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/">Dungeons and Dragons</a> club of Hawkins high school. </p>
<p>The club is primarily made up of the school’s “losers” and outcasts – none of whom could have anticipated being framed by their small town as an evil cult responsible for the murders taking place. </p>
<p>While the fate of the Hawkins Hellfire leader and members still hangs in the balance, we can look to its origins in history – the Hellfire Club of the 18th century – for clues of what to expect in this finale. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471054/original/file-20220627-11-7ry6h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In Stranger Things, the Hellfire Club is the name of the local high school Dungeons and Dragons club – a far cry from the debauched original club of the same name.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The OG Hellfire Club</h2>
<p>Phillip, Duke of Wharton, founded the first official Hellfire Club in 1718. The club was primarily a parodic take on the popular trend of <a href="https://www.norfolktowneassembly.org/post/i-ll-be-at-my-club-gentlemen-s-clubs-in-georgian-england-and-america#:%7E:text=A%20traditional%20gentlemen's%20club%20was,century%20and%20early%2020th%20century.">gentleman clubs</a> across London at the time – admission was open to both men and women. </p>
<p>However, rather than meeting to discuss poetry and politics, the main aim of the Hellfire Club was to mock religion and its inherent hypocrisies – the club leader was called “The Devil” and members were encouraged to come dressed as biblical characters. As well as partaking in satirical religious ceremonies, the club would enjoy festive meals of Holy Ghost Pie, Breast of Venus, and Devil’s Loin. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/by-naming-pennhurst-stranger-things-uses-disability-trauma-for-entertainment-dark-tourism-and-asylum-tours-do-too-185581">By naming 'Pennhurst', Stranger Things uses disability trauma for entertainment. Dark tourism and asylum tours do too</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>The notorious Hellfire Club</h2>
<p>While Wharton’s club was reluctantly disbanded in 1721, it would go on to be replaced by the most notorious Hellfire Club in history. </p>
<p>Indeed, the Hellfire Club is often synonymous with Sir Francis Dashwood’s club. This club was originally named the Order of the Friars of St Francis of Wycombe, and the members known as “the monks” - however, that it not the name that history would remember it by. Dashwood was himself a scandalous figure, known as a man with a true “genius for obscenity.” His love for promiscuity was matched with his flair for the dramatic.</p>
<p>In 1751, Dashwood leased the remarkable <a href="https://historicengland.org.uk/services-skills/education/educational-images/medmenham-abbey-medmenham-1472">Medmenham Abbey</a> and had this medieval ruin entirely renovated in Gothic style for the purpose of this club. Written into a stained glass window on the doorway was the club’s motto, “Fais ce que tu voudras” — Do what thou wilt. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1021&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1021&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471061/original/file-20220627-18-ua55lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1021&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Portrait of Francis Dashwood by William Hogarth from the late 1750s, parodying Renaissance images of Francis of Assisi. The Bible has been replaced by a copy of the erotic novel Elegantiae Latini sermonis, and the profile of Dashwood’s friend Lord Sandwich peers from the halo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Artwork by <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Hogarth">William Hogarth</a> is believed to have once decorated the walls, depicting club members in a range of erotic activities. The library was stocked with the most infamous pornographic works of the time, such as John Cleland’s <a href="https://www.penguin.com.au/books/fanny-hill-or-memoirs-of-a-woman-of-pleasure-9780140432497">Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure</a> (1749). </p>
<p>Club members consisted of some of the most influential figures of the time: including Thomas Potter, John Wilkes, John Montagu, William Hogarth, George Dodington, Benjamin Bates II, and many more. Even Benjamin Franklin is thought to have been a member, as he is recorded to have stayed at Medmenham Abbey at the time a meeting was taking place – a privilege only allowed to Hellfire members. </p>
<h2>What happened at the Hellfire Club?</h2>
<p>The club met only twice a year, with an AGM which lasted more than a week in September or June. Each member encouraged to bring female guests of “a cheerful, lively disposition.” </p>
<p>As written in <a href="https://archive.org/details/NocturnalRevelsOrTheHistoryOfKings-placeAndOtherModernNunneriesVol">Nocturnal Revels (1779)</a>, a book which claimed to have been authored by one of these “monk[s] of the Order of St Francis,” </p>
<blockquote>
<p>no vows of celibacy were required either by the ladies or the Monks, the former considering themselves as the lawful wives of the brethren during their stay within the monastic walls, every Monk being religiously scrupulous not to infringe upon the nuptial alliance of any other brother.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Under the cover of darkness, adorned in masks and cloaks, the club members would make their way across the river Thames in gondolas to the Abbey. They were greeted with a concoction made of brandy and brimstone and would drink to the Gods of Darkness. The group kept the same parodic religious rituals which had been performed by Wharton’s group. </p>
<p>As Horace Walpole, an English writer of the time, describes, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>the members’ practice was rigorously pagan: Bacchus and Venus were the deities to whom they almost publicly sacrificed; and the nymphs and the hogsheads that were laid in against the festivals of this new church, sufficiently informed the neighborhood of the complexion of those hermits.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Throughout the night, they would gradually make their way through the Abbey – and the activities reportedly became more and more obscene. One reported (if unconfirmed) story goes that a baboon dressed as a devil was once in attendance, and gave John Wilkes such a fright when it was released from a chest that he begged the devil to spare him and proclaimed he was “but half a sinner”. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471278/original/file-20220628-17-ex91d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Medmenham Abbey. The mansion was built in 1595 on the site of a Cistercian abbey. To the right are the ruined folly tower and cloister that were added in 1755 for Sir Francis Dashwood.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Notoriety and the underground</h2>
<p>In 1760, a publication appeared (<a href="https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/chrysal-or-the-adventures-of-a-guinea-1760">Chrysal, or the Adventures of a Guinea</a>) which made the Hellfire Club’s activities known to the general public – identifying Medmenham Abbey and even making reference to this infamous baboon story. Rumours had spread about the activities of the club, and while few had access particulars, the general perception was that it was a blasphemous and bawdy club that partook in sinful, libertine behaviour.</p>
<p>It is believed the tourists would flock around the island to try and catch a glimpse of this notorious club, made up of such prominent members. It was around this time that Dashwood moved the club activities underground (literally) into a series of elaborate caves and tunnels built under Dashwood’s garden at West Wycombe. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471279/original/file-20220628-13-g9d50m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Hellfire Caves (also known as the West Wycombe Caves) are a network of man-made chalk and flint caverns which extend 260m underground. They were excavated between 1748 and 1752 for Francis Dashwood, founder of the Society of Dilettanti and co-founder of the Hellfire Club, whose meetings were held in the caves.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Farewell Hellfire Club</h2>
<p>The club was finally abandoned in 1766. Records and reports of membership to this Hellfire Club were used to bring about the political ruin of many of its members — a witch-hunt which bears reflection within Stranger Things own Hellfire Club.</p>
<p>While Dashwood and Franklin faced a baboon rather than Vecna, we can draw some comparisons from this historical example. Both clubs were formed by figures disillusioned by polite society, and were met with outrage from the society they so condemned. And, ultimately, this condemnation was stronger.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185869/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Esmé Louise James does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Hellfire Club in Stranger Things is a school DnD club – but the real Hellfire Club from history which it’s based upon is far more scandalous and notorious.Esmé Louise James, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1855812022-06-28T19:56:02Z2022-06-28T19:56:02ZBy naming ‘Pennhurst’, Stranger Things uses disability trauma for entertainment. Dark tourism and asylum tours do too<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/477276/original/file-20220803-25-dh1r2l.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=5%2C7%2C1248%2C733&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Netflix sci-fi horror series <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4574334/">Stranger Things</a> is vividly soaked in 1980s nostalgia, famously catapulting Kate Bush’s 1985 song <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/jun/22/the-whole-worlds-gone-mad-kate-bush-on-running-up-that-hills-success">Running up that Hill</a> to the top of the music charts in 2022.</p>
<p>In season four, series creators the Duffer Brothers introduce viewers to <a href="https://strangerthings.fandom.com/wiki/Pennhurst_Mental_Hospital">Pennhurst Mental Hospital</a> for the criminally insane (which was also mentioned in season one). Viewers follow teenage sleuths Robin and Nancy into Pennhurst, where they are granted permission to speak with <a href="https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/robert-englund-stranger-things-victor-creel-interview">Victor Creel</a>, imprisoned because he is thought to have brutally murdered his family. </p>
<p>Although the Pennhurst Mental Hospital portrayed in Stranger Things is fictitious, the location was inspired by the <a href="http://www.preservepennhurst.org/default.aspx?pg=36">Eastern Pennsylvania State Institution for the Feeble-Minded and Epileptic</a>. Later named the <a href="https://philadelphiaencyclopedia.org/essays/pennhurst-state-school-and-hospital/">Pennhurst State School and Hospital</a> and located in the woods of Chester County, Pennsylvania, it was founded in 1908 and shut down in 1987. More than 10,000 people with intellectual disability and mental illness lived at Pennhurst, many spending their entire lives within its walls. </p>
<p>The real Pennhurst has become a tourist attraction, like dozens of empty asylums around the world, including some in Australia. But as we seek out thrills, we shouldn’t forget these institutions held real people and their stories.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/people-with-disability-are-more-likely-to-be-victims-of-crime-heres-why-111999">People with disability are more likely to be victims of crime – here's why</a>
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<h2>Pennhurst, then freedom</h2>
<p>Pennhurst was a place of <a href="http://www.preservepennhurst.org/default.aspx?pg=38">segregation, power, abuse, neglect and torture</a>, fuelled by society’s perception that people with intellectual disability were a dangerous threat to social order. </p>
<p>At the dawn of the 19th century’s <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4202623/">eugenics movement</a>, people with intellectual disability existed on the lowest rung of the human hierarchy. Ultimately, they were removed from the human gene pool through institutionalisation and sterilisation.</p>
<p>In 1987, in response to the disability rights movement’s loud call for de-institutionalisation and after <a href="http://www.preservepennhurst.org/default.aspx?pg=1649">groundbreaking litigation</a> brought by a resident and her family, the State of Pennsylvania closed Pennhurst’s doors. The courts agreed those in state care had a constitutional right to appropriate treatment and education. More than 1,000 Pennhurst residents began lives of worth and value in the community. </p>
<p>In 2010, the state of Pennsylvania sold the site. Today, Pennhurst exists as a “<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/142066.Dark_Tourism">dark tourism</a>” destination. <a href="https://pennhurstasylum.com/">Pennhurst Asylum</a> entertains visitors with “jump scares” around a narrative of depraved criminality, that simultaneously erases and evokes the inhumane treatment of the people who called Pennhurst home. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Old building with flowers nearby" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471041/original/file-20220627-14-fw6o00.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Pennhurst today.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Admin-current-pennhurst.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
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<h2>Real people, real stories</h2>
<p>To those who lived there and their supporters, Pennhurst is more than the horrors of its past and the commercialisation of its future. </p>
<p>For Dennis Downey and James Conroy, editors of <a href="https://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-08603-3.html">Pennhurst and the Struggle for Disability Rights</a>, Pennhurst represents “one of the great, if unrecognised, freedom struggles of the twentieth century”, fanning the flames of the global de-institutionalisation and independent living movements. </p>
<p>Following Pennhurst’s closure, most Western nations began closing institutions. This independent living movement was a precursor to the 2006 <a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities-2.html">United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities/article-19-living-independently-and-being-included-in-the-community.html">Article 19</a> of the convention obliges signatory nations to ensure “the equal right of all persons with disabilities to live in the community, with choices equal to others”. And <a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities/article-12-equal-recognition-before-the-law.html">Article 12</a> asks signatory nations to recognise that all citizens, regardless of disability, have “<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10383441.2021.2003744">legal personhood</a>” and therefore should enjoy autonomy and respect. </p>
<p>The convention charges signatory nations with an unequivocal obligation to firmly make the traumatic experiences of institutionalisation a thing of the past, while acknowledging and preserving the stories of trauma as narratives of dignity and respect.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1188165201591332864"}"></div></p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/over-1-000-australians-with-cognitive-disability-are-detained-indefinitely-each-year-this-shameful-practice-needs-to-stop-153724">Over 1,000 Australians with cognitive disability are detained indefinitely each year. This shameful practice needs to stop</a>
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<h2>A global ghost tour</h2>
<p>Pennhurst is one of many “haunted” tourist attractions worldwide inspired by traumatised lives of people with disability. </p>
<p>A hemisphere away, high on a hill, overlooking the rural town of Ararat in Western Victoria, Australia, stands <a href="https://www.aradale.com.au/">Aradale Lunatic Asylum</a>, location of the notorious <a href="https://www.jward.org.au/">J-Ward</a>. </p>
<p>During its years of operation from 1867 to 1993, it was home to more than 10,000 people with disability. Like Pennhurst, the past two decades have seen a transformation of Aradale into a tourist attraction, exploiting the very real and horrific life experiences of the people who called it home. </p>
<p>Thrill-seekers can join the <a href="https://www.eerietours.com.au/tours/aradale-ghost-tour/">Aradale ghost tour</a> and be haunted by such ghostly “tickling, strange smells, banging sounds, shadows, and other spooky sensations”.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="old stone building" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471062/original/file-20220627-18-q7vf1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Ararat prison asylum.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ararat_prison_asylum.jpg">Wikimedia Commons/Denis Frolow</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>Tours and “paranormal investigations” also <a href="https://www.explorebeechworth.com.au/listing/asylum-ghost-tours-beechworth/">operate</a> at the former Mayday Hills Lunatic Asylum, in Beechworth, Victoria. Tours of Sydney’s <a href="https://www.sydneyhistorytour.com/gladesville-mental-hospital---day-at-the-asylum-tour.html">Gladesville Mental Hospital</a>, formerly Tarban Creek Lunatic Asylum, are currently on hold due to COVID.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.thrillist.com/travel/nation/abandoned-asylums-world-s-most-terrifying-haunted-asylums">Shuttered institutions</a> that were once home to people with disabilities in the United States, Norway, Austria and South Korea are regularly <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/the-most-haunted-places-in-the-united-states">grouped</a> into terrifying online itineraries. </p>
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<span class="caption">The asylum at Beechworth, where tours run today.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Beechworthasylum.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
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<h2>Acknowledge and preserve their stories</h2>
<p>Dark tourism operators sell thrilling customer experiences – but the stories of people with disability who lived behind the walls of institutions like Pennhurst and Aradale are much darker. </p>
<p>By relying on offensive and misguided portrayals of people with disability as horrifying, dangerous and criminal, operators exploit the ways residents were treated for commercialised entertainment. </p>
<p>Ironically, London’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20161213-how-bedlam-became-a-palace-for-lunatics">Bethlem Hospital</a> (from which the word “bedlam” originated) <a href="https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/bedlams-theatre-madness-mental-hospital-8845687">reportedly ran tours</a> for curious visitors to gawk at residents until 1770. But today, the <a href="https://museumofthemind.org.uk/">Bethlem Museum of the Mind</a> houses archives and art “to support the history of mental healthcare and treatment”. An <a href="https://museumofthemind.org.uk/whats-on/exhibitions/a-way-from-home-bethlem-artists-on-longing-and-belonging">upcoming exhibition</a> explores how “experiences of trauma, mental distress, contact with mental health services and everyday life can shape and disrupt a person’s sense of home”.</p>
<p>Netflix and filmmakers like the Duffer Brothers have an opportunity to acknowledge and preserve the stories of institutionalised communal trauma. A simple dedication to Pennhurst residents could even be added to a Stranger Things episode or opening credits. It could educate a generation of world citizens about the crimes of the past and the intrinsic personhood of all of humanity.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/jimmy-savile-how-the-netflix-documentary-fails-to-address-the-role-institutions-play-in-abuse-181383">Jimmy Savile: how the Netflix documentary fails to address the role institutions play in abuse</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185581/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joanne Watson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The real Pennhurst – a hospital name-checked in the latest series of Stranger Things – was a place of segregation and abuse.Joanne Watson, Senior Lecturer in Disability and Inclusion, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1845712022-06-14T19:58:45Z2022-06-14T19:58:45ZEthereal, evocative, and inventive: why the music of Kate Bush spans generations<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/468652/original/file-20220614-14-ul2xam.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C698%2C392&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Keen observers of popular culture will have become aware of the recent inclusion of Kate Bush’s 1985 song Running Up That Hill into the storyline of the widely-watched Netflix show Stranger Things. As a result of this inclusion, Kate Bush’s classic song was catapulted (again) into the mainstream musical scene, experiencing a <a href="https://theconversation.com/running-up-that-hill-how-stranger-things-and-tiktok-pushed-kate-bushs-1985-pop-classic-back-to-the-top-of-the-charts-184443">true resurgence in popularity</a> and ranking highly in download charts around the world. </p>
<p>Kate Bush herself <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/jun/06/kate-bush-thanks-stranger-things-fans-as-running-up-that-hill-climbs-charts">provided a response</a> by issuing a rare message on social media about the whole affair, not only declaring her enthusiasm over Stranger Things, but also her gratitude for its ability to bestow “a new lease of life” upon her now famous song. </p>
<p>As a result of the boost in popularity of Running Up That Hill, there has been great talk of a whole new group of music listeners from the Gen Z demographic <a href="https://www.vogue.com/article/kate-bush-stranger-things-gen-z-discovery">“discovering”</a> Kate Bush’s work, and becoming instantly enamoured with it. </p>
<p>An anecdotal look would seem to suggest that, somehow, Kate Bush is reaching greater fame in 2022 than she did during the 1980s, a prolific creative period that many would rank (unkindly) as the peak of her musical journey. And yet, while there is no denying the instant hold that Kate Bush’s music seems to be having on current listeners, there is definitely something strange in suggesting that her fame was only moderate in previous decades. </p>
<p>Indeed, Kate Bush was popular during and after the ‘80s, especially in the UK, and her music has been continuously well-received by a growing number of avid fans since. </p>
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<h2>In and out of the mainstream</h2>
<p>Since her debut in the late 1970s, Kate Bush has released over <a href="https://www.officialcharts.com/artist/27937/kate-bush">25 UK Top 40 singles</a>, including Babooshka (#5, 1980), Hounds of Love (#18, 1986), Rubberband Girl (#12, 1993), The Red Shoes (#21, 1994), and King of the Mountain (#4, 2005). </p>
<p>The 2022 impact of Stranger Things on fans of her music only signals cycles of discovery, re-discovery, and re-appreciation that have been characteristic of Kate Bush’ music and performances ever since she first broke onto the scene as a decidedly <a href="https://www.economist.com/prospero/2018/11/20/was-kate-bush-the-last-of-britains-avant-garde-hitmakers">avant-garde artist in 1978</a>. Her now well-known hit Wuthering Heights, reached #1 in the UK Singles charts.</p>
<p>So, one is left to wonder as to the reason for Kate Bush’s long-standing appeal. While there are likely many different reasons for this – undoubtedly including the ever-changing circumstances of individual music listeners – there are certainly aspects of Kate Bush’s music, performances and perhaps even persona that feed her enduring attraction. </p>
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<h2>Experimental and innovative</h2>
<p>Kate Bush’s music was undoubtedly experimental and innovative in the late '70s and '80s. Its seemingly open disregard for the dominant musical trends of the time conferred upon her songs a certain out-of-time quality, which transformed and materialised into a timeliness appeal. </p>
<p>Her music’s refusal to fit into strict categories of genre and audience classification is perhaps what makes it able to seemingly morph according to situation, attuning itself to changing tastes, and squeezing itself into the evolving bounds of cultural relevance. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/running-up-that-hill-how-stranger-things-and-tiktok-pushed-kate-bushs-1985-pop-classic-back-to-the-top-of-the-charts-184443">Running Up That Hill: How Stranger Things and TikTok pushed Kate Bush’s 1985 pop classic back to the top of the charts</a>
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<p>In addition to the very particular sound qualities of her music, one must also take into account the visual appeal of Kate Bush’ actual performances. Her music videos, where she is known to display arresting, sinuous choreographies and <a href="https://i-d.vice.com/en_uk/article/dygqpy/7-of-kate-bushs-most-iconic-outfits">floating gowns</a>, create a dream-like atmosphere. </p>
<p>While a touch of the late '70s and '80s can certainly be spotted in her videos, with the typical soft-focus lenses of the time making an obvious appearance, her performances are beautifully strange and suggestively haunting. The choreography seen in the video for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tP2HXHkFpW4">Wuthering Heights</a> is particularly well-known in this respect. Here, Kate sports an arresting, floaty red dress, and dances lithely in a natural landscape, incorporating mesmerising movements into her routine, while a light mist surrounds her.</p>
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<p>The recurring combination of unconventional sounds and visuals is arguably what established Kate Bush as a distinct icon: one who is not only instantly recognisable for her almost intoxicating individuality, but who is also seemingly unfettered by the restrictions of neither time nor space. </p>
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<h2>A contemporary icon</h2>
<p>There is no doubting the fact that Kate Bush’s lyrics speak to a variety of identities and desires. She has been credited as an extremely <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/jun/07/ooh-yeah-youre-amazing-the-wonder-of-kate-bush-and-10-tracks-to-delight-new-listeners">influential figure by contemporary artists</a> such as Lady Gaga, Tori Amos, and Florence + The Machine.</p>
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<p>Unavoidably, there is a lot of nostalgia involved in the constant re-discovery of Kate Bush’s music as well, especially for those fans whose memories are attached to her songs from different moments in time. And yet, there also seems to be something more peculiar at play. Kate Bush’s music has a certain nostalgic feel to it, even if new fans and listeners do not have any actual memories of the past associated with her songs. </p>
<p>There is an intimate sense of longing that is interlaced within the fabric her work: a desire to feel, to experience, and to find oneself, which makes her performances so captivating. It is perhaps this definitive characteristic that maintains Kate Bush’s multi-generational appeal, as her music continues to speak to a multitude of fans across the years.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184571/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lorna Piatti-Farnell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kate Bush has been ‘discovered’ by a younger generation of fans, proving that her music has a timeless appeal.Lorna Piatti-Farnell, Professor of Film, Media, and Popular Culture, Auckland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1844432022-06-06T05:03:31Z2022-06-06T05:03:31ZRunning Up That Hill: How Stranger Things and TikTok pushed Kate Bush’s 1985 pop classic back to the top of the charts<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467070/original/file-20220606-58929-dq1m16.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=22%2C0%2C3810%2C1890&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Netflix’s nostalgia-laden thriller <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4574334/">Stranger Things</a> returned last month and with it came the revival of another classic from the 1980s, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wp43OdtAAkM">Running Up That Hill</a> by Kate Bush. The song plays a prominent part in the narrative connected to one of the show’s leading teen cast members and is featured in a climatic, and visually stunning scene that has been making the rounds on the internet. </p>
<p>In a post shared to her <a href="https://www.katebush.com/news/stranger-things">website</a> over the weekend, Kate Bush showered praise on the show and Netflix: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>You might’ve heard that the first part of the fantastic, gripping new series of Stranger Things has recently been released on Netflix… It features the song, ‘Running Up That Hill’ which is being given a whole new lease of life by the young fans who love the show – I love it too!</p>
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<h2>Making a deal with TikTok</h2>
<p>One thing missing from the acknowledgement is mention of another digital platform helping to boost the song’s presence: TikTok. A thirty-second version of the Stranger Things clip has been posted and reposted on TikTok, gaining millions of views in just over a week, and Kate Bush’s song has been used in over 500,000 short videos. </p>
<p>Videos featuring the song depict teens cosplaying as characters, acting out scenes from the shows, and making humorous <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@baconwithsyruppp/video/7104096896326585643">meme videos</a> (“my friends playing my favourite song trying to save me… my airpods die”). </p>
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<p>Others engage less with Stranger Things and more with Kate Bush, in videos depicting connecting with parents over a shared love, recommending more of Bush’s music, and sharing joy that a new generation of audiences might be discovering the influential artist for the first time. The song <a href="https://www.salon.com/2022/05/31/stranger-things-kate-bush-tiktok-running-up-that-hill/">speaks to misfits and of desperation</a>, themes as relevant to teens in 2022 as they were in 1985. </p>
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<h2>Running up that hill and going viral</h2>
<p>The runaway resurgence of Bush’s 1985 classic could be a signal to film and TV producers to make clips more “TikTokable”. </p>
<p>Songs with short catchy hooks that are attached to eye-grabbing visual sequences in clips that are sixty, or better yet thirty, seconds maximum are more likely to be picked up on and shared on TikTok. </p>
<p>The chances of going viral can be improved by choosing classic chart-toppers that may find a revival among younger audiences. Naturally when a beloved artist is found by Gen-Z audiences, it leads to<a href="https://www.pedestrian.tv/music/stranger-things-kate-bush-fans-gate-keeping/"> gatekeeping by longtime fans</a> as well as counter-gatekeeping by fans who are thrilled to see a younger audience connecting with one of their favourite artists’ music. </p>
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<p>Stranger Things is not the first to capitalise on the power of <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/43bxpn/the-science-behind-musics-nostalgic-power">musical nostalgia</a>. The success of films like <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2014/08/04/guardians-of-the-galaxy-1970s-soundtrack/13580579/">Guardians of the Galaxy</a> have proven to be powerful tools to give older a reprisal on the radio and popular charts. TikTok challenges and audio memes have helped catapult other classics back into vogue such as Harry Belafonte’s Jump in the Line, The Shangri-Las’s Leader of the Pack remixed into Oh No by Kreepa, and, of course, Fleetwood Mac’s <a href="https://filmdaily.co/news/fleetwood-mac-tiktok/">Dreams</a>. </p>
<p>TikTok is a music-centric platform. It takes advantage of musical innovations pioneered on earlier short video platforms, like Flipagram, Dubsmash, and Musical.ly. These platforms allowed users to draw from an internal library of popular songs, creatively add them to video creations, and use features like Duet to place themselves side-by-side their favourite artists. </p>
<p>Unlike streaming services like Apple Music or Spotify, users can take a more active and playful role interacting with music on TikTok.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/halseys-record-label-wont-release-a-new-song-until-it-goes-viral-on-tiktok-is-this-the-future-of-the-music-industry-183720">Halsey's record label won't release a new song until it goes viral on TikTok. Is this the future of the music industry?</a>
</strong>
</em>
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<h2>Radio and the charts</h2>
<p>As with other musical TikTok phenomena, Running Up That Hill might be more than a momentary flash in the pan. In 2020, <a href="https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/tiktok-says-over-70-artists-that-broke-on-the-platform-this-year-have-signed-major-label-deals/">TikTok claimed</a> over 70 artists who first emerged on the platform had secured record deals an the <a href="https://www.billboard.com/photos/songs-tiktok-viral-chart/1-dixie-damelio-2020-cr-flannery-underwood-billboard-1548-1594396309/">Billboard charts</a> now frequently feature songs that went viral.</p>
<p>The song has returned to the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/jun/03/kate-bush-running-up-that-hill-uk-top-10-stranger-things">Top 10 singles charts in the UK</a> and is set to overtake Harry Styles As it Was as the <a href="https://musicfeeds.com.au/news/kate-bushs-running-up-that-hill-is-on-track-to-be-australias-number-one-single-this-week/">number one single in Australia</a>.</p>
<p>Kate Bush being reserviced to radio, physically or digitally delivering music to radio stations by her label, is a significant development. In the past much money and influence has been involved in getting music onto the radio. For a song that has not received play for decades to spontaneously reappear is a “watershed moment” according to <a href="https://www.billboard.com/pro/kate-bush-running-up-that-hill-stranger-things-radio-service/">a Warner Music label executive</a>. Despite the growth and dominance of streaming, radio still plays a pivotal role for curation and discover in music markets such as the <a href="https://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/article/2019/the-steady-reach-of-radio-winning-consumers-attention/">US</a>, <a href="https://www.acma.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-11/Trends-in-viewing-and-listening-behaviour_ACMA-consumer-survey-2020.pdf">Australia</a>, and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/19376529.2021.2023536">around the world</a>. </p>
<p>Radio play brings songs like to those who might not use TikTok or haven’t gotten around to watching the new season of Stranger Things. </p>
<p>While much focus in the music industry has centred on how to make <a href="https://theconversation.com/halseys-record-label-wont-release-a-new-song-until-it-goes-viral-on-tiktok-is-this-the-future-of-the-music-industry-183720">songs go viral</a> on TikTok, labels and artists might want to reconsider the radio as the true measure of success for songs traveling through the pipeline from TV to TikTok to Top 40.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184443/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>D. Bondy Valdovinos Kaye does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Running Up That Hill had a prominent moment in the new season of Netflix’s Stranger Things – and now it’s being played on commercial radio and being discovered by a younger audience.D. Bondy Valdovinos Kaye, Lecturer, Queensland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1000412018-07-16T14:26:53Z2018-07-16T14:26:53ZSecret ingredient that made Netflix a world beater could lead to its demise<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227819/original/file-20180716-44094-157a6w0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Sofa so good. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/aachen-germany-october-2017man-holds-remote-729647752?src=TduN4Um9uoJD7xn9IgiKEw-1-36">r.classen</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Netflix’s <a href="https://deadline.com/2018/07/netflix-misses-subscriber-growth-projections-second-quarter-1202427273/">latest</a> half-year results have disappointed the market, sending shares in the TV streaming giant down 13% overnight. When this is the reaction to adding 5m subscribers in three months, taking your total to 130m around the world, it certainly tells you something. </p>
<p>In the last 12 months the stock had <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/NFLX/chart?p=NFLX">skyrocketed</a> from US$158 to US$396, light years ahead of the <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/12/netflix-downgraded-by-ubs-because-of-high-valuation-analyst-says-good.html">S&P 500 average</a>. This was partly driven by a stellar quarterly <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/netflix-releases-first-quarter-2018-financial-results-300630554.html">earnings report</a> in April, which raised analysts’ and investors’ expectations about whether the company could maintain its incredible growth trajectory. Netflix had set its quarterly target at 1.2m more subscribers from the US and 5m from the rest of the world. Some analysts decided even this was conservative, publishing still higher growth expectations to justify the ambitious company valuation. </p>
<p>Yet the <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/12/netflix-downgraded-by-ubs-because-of-high-valuation-analyst-says-good.html">notes</a> of <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/13/deutsche-bank-warns-netflix-may-miss-second-quarter-subscriber-expecta.html">caution</a> creeping in shortly before the new results have turned out to be justified. A Macquarie analyst <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-07-13/netflix-subscriber-growth-faces-new-test-after-46-billion-rally">had argued</a> that “expectations have gotten ahead of themselves”. Netflix missed both its US and international targets, adding 700,000 and 4.5m subscribers respectively. Cutthroat competition from the likes of Amazon, Hulu and HBO was help up to blame. </p>
<p>Netflix has done a remarkable job of <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/08/28/435583328/episode-647-hard-work-is-irrelevant?t=1531750232006">reinventing itself</a> from its original incarnation as a DVD sales/rental company founded in 1997, to the world’s leading streaming service. It has managed to differentiate itself from the competition largely by becoming a major producer of award-winning content like <a href="https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/70178217">House of Cards</a>, <a href="https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/70242311">Orange is the New Black</a> and <a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/80057281">Stranger Things</a>. </p>
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<p>Netflix’s commissions are based on a deep understanding of its subscribers’ viewing patterns and preferences. This has enabled the company to raise its charges despite the competition, and thus capitalise on the huge subscriber base. <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2016/9/21/12997058/netflix-originals-half-catalog-streaming">The aim</a> for the next few years is for half of the entire library to be shows and films made exclusively for Netflix. In 2018 alone, the company is <a href="http://fortune.com/2018/07/08/netflix-original-programming-13-billion/">expected to</a> spend US$12 billion to US$13 billion on new content – <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2017/10/16/16486436/netflix-original-content-8-billion-dollars-anime-films">way ahead of</a> the US$8 billion that was previously planned. </p>
<p>This has created a service second only to HBO in terms of worldwide subscriber numbers (and a <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/fb6b3db2-6708-11e7-9a66-93fb352ba1fe">large part</a> of HBO’s 142m total base is US customers who buy its package of channels via cable networks). Netflix’s approach to streaming is different to many other players in the market. We can broadly split the rest of the contenders into three categories: bundlers, broadcasters and big content giants:</p>
<h2>1. The bundler</h2>
<p>Amazon’s <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Prime-Video/b?ie=UTF8&node=3280626031">streaming service</a> is “bundled” into its Amazon Prime offering, which gives Amazon’s retail customers a whole raft of benefits ranging from cheap nappies to faster delivery times. Offering video and music streaming as a complex bundle of products and services has important competitive implications. </p>
<p>It means Amazon is potentially able to run the streaming service at a loss, provided it can create sufficient margins elsewhere in the service. This makes it easier for Amazon to put other streaming providers under pressure with low subscription charges. Amazon Prime is Netflix’s nearest streaming rival <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/a70cf344-4350-11e8-93cf-67ac3a6482fd">with around</a> 100m subscribers worldwide. </p>
<h2>2. The broadcaster</h2>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=628&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=628&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227824/original/file-20180716-44097-odohpy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=628&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<p>Most broadcasters offer streaming as an add-on to their existing TV or cable TV offering. Such offerings can be without additional cost to the consumer, such as the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer">BBC iPlayer</a>, or part of a subscription model, such as the <a href="https://www.hbo.com/order">HBO Now</a> offering. </p>
<p>Similarly to Netflix, these companies also compete by offering unique content. For free broadcasters, it’s a means of maximising the size of their audience – whether for public service or for the benefit of advertisers. For the likes of HBO, it’s a way of tapping into customer segments they would otherwise not capture with their traditional cable TV service. </p>
<h2>3. The big content giants</h2>
<p>In future, the market for streaming services is set to get even more contested as production giants move in. I’m thinking particularly of Disney, which is on track to launch its <a href="https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2018/02/disneys-streaming-service-launching-in-2019-film-a.html">own streaming service</a> next autumn. </p>
<p>Streaming providers already pay a substantial share of revenue in fees to major producers for the rights to blockbusters like Frozen or the Toy Story franchise, but Disney for one has decided it can do better. It <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/disney-ending-exclusive-netflix-deal-in-2019-launching-rival-streaming-service-2017-8">will end</a> its exclusive supply deal with Netflix once its own service launches. It has not yet said if the Star Wars and Marvel movies will be included, but Disney’s move is clearly a major blow to Netflix. </p>
<h2>The road ahead</h2>
<p>Netflix’s decision to bet on unique rather than licensed content looks like the right decision in this context. Yet it faces a challenging future. Apple is also <a href="https://www.tubefilter.com/2018/03/27/apple-streaming-service-march-2019-launch/">due to</a> launch a streaming service next year and has been spending upwards of US$1 billion on original content in preparation. Spotify and Hulu <a href="http://www.cityam.com/283800/hulu-and-spotify-offer-single-video-and-music-streaming">also recently</a> announced a tie-up to offer a combined video and music streaming service. </p>
<p>From Netflix’s point of view, there is arguably little room for growth in the core US market, with almost one in every two households already signed up. It dwarfs Comcast and DirecTV, the largest respective cable and satellite providers in the market, who have little over 20m US subscribers each. Netflix is already putting <a href="https://money.cnn.com/2018/02/27/media/netflix-worldwide-content/index.html">more emphasis</a> on productions in different languages to maximise the international appeal of the business. Commendable on one level, investing in more “regional” content that might not find mass appeal may be a problem for profitability. </p>
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<p>Netflix is experimenting with additional routes to market to increase its subscriber base in other ways. One is joining the “bundlers” via a collaboration with Comcast, in which Netflix <a href="https://media.netflix.com/en/press-releases/comcast-and-netflix-expand-partnership-following-successful-xfinity-x1-integration">is being offered</a> as an added attraction to Comcast pay-TV subscribers. Netflix <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/mar/01/sky-subscribers-to-get-netflix-for-the-first-time">recently</a> did a similar deal with BSkyB for the UK and Europe. </p>
<p>At the same time, Netflix’s current source of success has created an additional major challenge for the future. It has managed to differentiate itself with superb content in a market that is incredibly fast-moving and constantly looking for innovation. Subscribers expect Netflix to deliver innovative shows that they can binge watch. The company is looking at a potentially vicious circle of high content costs and fast content consumption. If it is going to defend its position, it is going to have to continue to spot great new stories and turn them into essential viewing.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100041/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Friesl does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In ten years, Netflix has built up a streaming business with a staggering 125m subscribers. Here’s what it needs to do next.Martin Friesl, Senior Lecturer in Strategic Management, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/895222018-01-02T23:04:44Z2018-01-02T23:04:44ZStranger Things 2 relies on nostalgic race politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200573/original/file-20180102-26151-1lpztgi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Stranger Things 2 aims to raise political issues but misses the radical roots of rainbow coalition politics in episode seven and instead falls into mainstream Hollywood traps of centrist politics. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Courtesy of Netflix)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>David K. Harbour, who plays Sheriff Hooper on the Netflix series <em>Stranger Things</em>, brought the house down <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c996ra7Wqn0">when he accepted the Screen Actors’ Guild award for best television show</a> a year ago. </p>
<p>He alluded to the 45th U.S. president in a fever pitch, speaking of “the violence of certain individuals and institutions.” Then he shouted: “Great acting can change the world!” The crowd of actors in the audience applauded wildly.</p>
<p>Likewise, the second season of <em>Stranger Things</em> ostentatiously invokes politics — without naming names.</p>
<p>This season’s antagonist is the Shadow Monster, a <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/08/hp-lovecraft-125/401471/">Lovecraftian</a> concoction of fury, tendril and tornado. The Shadow Monster possesses Will, one of of the show’s six young protagonists, and connects him to a network of subterranean vines that overwhelm him with hateful images and urges. </p>
<p>The heart of the Shadow Monster, when it is finally revealed, is oddly hairy and incandescently orange. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200480/original/file-20171223-16486-xhwqvo.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When it is finally revealed, the Shadow Monster’s heart is incandescently orange.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Courtesy of Netflix)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With the didacticism of a kid’s show that teaches while it entertains, <em>Stranger Things 2</em> even models an interpretation of the Shadow Monster for its audience. Another protagonist, Lucas, tells us to understand the Shadow Monster through “analogy,” and compares it to the Mind Flayer, a beast the boys know from the Dungeons & Dragons universe. </p>
<p>Another lead character, Dustin, explains further, with yet another analogy: “[The Mind Flayer] views other races like us as inferior to itself.” It’s like the Nazis “if the Nazis were from another dimension.” </p>
<p>Just as the boys use fiction and history to understand their real world monsters, so should we, the show suggests. </p>
<p>Clearly, <em>Stranger Things 2</em> stands against prejudice and racism in principle, but what is its fuller political vision? This is a fair question to ask of <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/stranger-things-2-tops-list-data-firms-popular-shows-us-1056701">one of the most popular shows on television</a>, especially since the show’s creators invite a political reading. </p>
<h2>The Lost Sister: “A very special episode”</h2>
<p>The much talked about Episode Seven, “The Lost Sister,” provides some answers.</p>
<p>In this episode, Eleven, a young woman with telekinetic powers, visits Chicago. <a href="http://www.vulture.com/2017/10/stranger-things-recap-season-2-episode-7.html">Audiences had a unique distaste for this anomalous instalment of the series</a> which removes us from the main plot, familiar setting and beloved characters of Hawkins, Indiana. </p>
<p>Defending their creative choices, <a href="http://www.vulture.com/2017/11/the-duffer-brothers-recap-stranger-things-2-the-lost-sister.html">the Duffer brothers explained</a> that “The Lost Sister” was important for Eleven’s character development but admitted that it was an “experiment.”</p>
<p>If it was an experiment, it’s another from the Duffers’ lab of 1980s revivalism. In this case, it’s <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/07/very-special-episode/398432/">“a very special episode.”</a> Good or bad, very special episodes are memorable for their abandonment of familiar tone, theme and story for the sake of serious messages about alcoholism, parental abuse or — as in one “very special episode” of <em>Punky Brewster</em> – the dangers of climbing inside abandoned refrigerators. In <em>Stranger Things 2</em>, the “very special episode” happens to be about radical politics. </p>
<p>In Chicago, Eleven (or El as she is called), who is white, meets Kali, a young South Asian woman. Despite their differences, the two recognize each other as sisters since they both have supernatural powers and lived in the same lab where they were brutally experimented upon. </p>
<p>Kali is the leader of a diverse group of misfits who are guided by a desire for revenge. As Kali explains it, her gang murders and steals from people who have hurt them. They squat in an abandoned building and spend much of their onscreen time fleeing the police. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=307&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=307&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=307&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=386&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=386&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200567/original/file-20180102-26145-1ue93ft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=386&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kali with her sister, El.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Courtesy of Netflix)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If you doubt that El, Kali and her group are a “rainbow coalition,” cover your head before you are hit on it: In the episode’s first 30 seconds, the word “rainbow” is uttered four times, the image of a rainbow flashed 10 times, interspersed with flashbacks to the young El and Kali in the lab. </p>
<h2>A short history of rainbow coalitions</h2>
<p>Fred Hampton, the charismatic young leader of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers, <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/05/black-panthers-young-patriots-fred-hampton">coined the term rainbow coalition</a> in 1968. <a href="http://www.tikkun.org/nextgen/the-original-rainbow-coalition-an-example-of-universal-identity-politics">History Prof. Jakobi E. Winters explains:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p><em>“The original Rainbow Coalition embodied the intersectionality of the critical issues of race, class, gender, anti-war, student, labor, and sexuality. It fused these various forms of identity politics into one group with one ideal form of identity — an identity that transcends differences and focuses on commonalities. The most common unifier was poverty.”</em></p>
</blockquote>
<p>This diverse, class-based coalition was a political innovation considered especially dangerous by law enforcement. In 1969, <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/fred-hampton-black-panther-shot-killed-chicago-730503">Fred Hampton, who was 21 years old, was murdered</a> by Chicago police while asleep at his home. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200482/original/file-20171223-18842-d2c05f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fred Hampton speaking at a Chicago Black Panther Rally in 1969.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.blackpast.org/aah/hampton-fred-1948-1969">(BlackPast.org)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1984, the year <em>Stranger Things 2</em> is set, rainbows were very much in the air, especially in Chicago. </p>
<p>Harold Washington had been recently elected the city’s first Black mayor and had installed a <a href="http://www.tikkun.org/nextgen/the-original-rainbow-coalition-an-example-of-universal-identity-politics">“Rainbow Cabinet.”</a></p>
<p>Jesse Jackson, in his run for the Democratic presidential nomination, <a href="http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jessejackson1984dnc.html">also drew on the support of the Rainbow Coalition</a>. The phrase would become predominately associated with him. In a sign of the co-opting to come, Jackson even copyrighted the phrase. </p>
<p>By the time Jackson ran his second presidential campaign in 1988, his Rainbow Coalition <a href="https://socialistworker.org/2013/04/12/jesse-jackson-and-the-rainbow">had already moved somewhat to the centre</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=660&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=660&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=660&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=830&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=830&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200564/original/file-20180102-26157-1gkpxxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=830&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President-elect Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama during his victory speech on Nov. 4, 2008 in Chicago.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A generation later, Barack Obama’s historic 2008 election victory was guided by a veteran of rainbow coalition campaigns, David Axelrod, who drew on rainbow coalition politics — even though in office, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/obama-revealed-a-moderate-republican/2011/04/25/AFPrGfkE_story.html?utm_term=.027d845b58b9">many of Obama’s economic policies turned out to be moderately conservative</a>. </p>
<p>By 2016, the electorate proved less receptive to Hillary Clinton’s invocation of a rainbow coalition theme for her campaign, <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/the-problem-with-hillary-clinton-isnt-just-her-corporate-cash-its-her-corporate-worldview/">partly because she was not seen as progressive.</a> </p>
<p>The rainbow coalition had lost its radical content as its rhetoric was co-opted by centrist politics. In turn, it became less convincing to the electorate. <em>Stranger Things 2</em> replays this appropriation in its own rainbow coalition, incorrectly endorsing it as the way to win. </p>
<h2>Centrism without race or class critiques</h2>
<p>Kali teaches El to weaponize her Jedi-style, telekinetic rage, which Eleven will eventually use to defeat the Trumpian Shadow Monster. Kali even gives El a feminist makeover: A boxy-shouldered blazer and slicked-back hair.</p>
<p>But after learning Kali’s power and adopting her style, El rejects Kali herself, put off by her propensity to violence. She foils Kali’s attempt to kill their former prison guard, and soon returns to Hawkins to reunite with Sheriff Hooper.</p>
<p>It’s hard not to read this as the rejection of what the show considers the unreasonable violence of people of colour. </p>
<p>What’s more, by invoking the issue of policing, <em>Stranger Things 2</em> alludes to Black Lives Matter, but manages only to repudiate that movement. </p>
<p>Kali tries to recruit El to her gang by criticizing El’s father figure, Sheriff Hooper. “Let me guess,” Kali says. “Your police man tries to stop you from using your gifts.” El nods, but ultimately chooses the side of law enforcement anyway.</p>
<p>Even as the Chicago police chase Kali and her friends, the police are shown to be essentially in the right. Kali’s gang always shoots first. Sheriff Hooper himself is gruff, but morally impeccable. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=265&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=265&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=265&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200506/original/file-20180101-26163-1getofy.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Chicago police in Episode Seven.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Courtesy of Netflix)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This uncomplicated validation of law enforcement, while common in popular culture, is disturbing given the violent fate of Fred Hampton, the man who first uttered the phrase “rainbow coalition.” His death at the hands of the police is exactly the kind of brutality that motivates Black Lives Matter today. </p>
<p>If we take its political analogies seriously, <em>Stranger Things 2</em> advocates for a return to rainbow coalition politics — but the kind of coalition that has been emptied of its substantial race and class critiques. </p>
<p>A famously nostalgic show, <em>Stranger Things 2</em> is nostalgic for 2008, a time before Black Lives Matter and Bernie Sanders. Like much of Hollywood, <em>Stranger Things 2</em> aligns itself with a centrist liberalism that hopes for a return to politics as usual after Trump. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, the progressive left has a longer memory, recognizing that politics as usual was a problem before the Shadow Monster arrived. If there is to be a return, it should be to a grassroots more like the original rainbow coalition.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89522/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Aaron Giovannone does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The makers of the wildly popular Netflix show, Stranger Things, have a political message as they allude to Trump with their hairy, orange Shadow Monster. But what are their actual politics?Aaron Giovannone, Adjunct Professor, Department of General Education, Mount Royal UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/866142017-10-31T05:42:41Z2017-10-31T05:42:41ZStranger Things 2 is darker and weirder, tempered with grief<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192572/original/file-20171031-18735-1hyny0d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The thing in Stranger Things 2 </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>This week, in the run-up to Halloween, Netflix released season two of Stranger Things, a sequel to last year’s runaway success. Like the previous season, Stranger Things 2 enjoys a visual style crafted from period-specific horror films first released in the early and mid-1980s. Part of the joy is in collecting these citations and echoes. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083907/">The Evil Dead</a> (1981), <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087800/">A Nightmare on Elm Street</a> (1984), and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087262/">Firestarter</a> (1984) are all very much present for this season, shaping the look and feel no less than explicit content. So too is the greatest of all seasonally appropriate films, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085636/">Halloween III: Season of the Witch</a> (1982), about which it is impossible not to think upon sights of rotted, worm-infested pumpkins.</p>
<p>Though I want to avoid dropping too many spoilers, there are some welcome differences at the level of narrative content: an expanded universe, new characters, and more Dustin (a charming <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089218/">Goonies</a> throwback from the central teen gang) all make for seriously addictive viewing. There are new mysteries to unravel and new threats to vanquish, as well as a healthy dose of urban revolt as manifest through telekinetic rage.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Further reading: <a href="https://theconversation.com/nostalgia-vhs-and-stranger-things-homage-to-80s-horror-63055">Nostalgia, VHS and Stranger Things’ homage to 80s horror</a></em></p>
<hr>
<p>But it’s also a much darker season. The previous year’s events have metastasized into psychic scars. The mood, this time around, is tempered by grief and trauma.</p>
<h2>New horror</h2>
<p>The most significant change, however, is in the type of horror now menacing the township of Hawkins. While the previous season established a sci-fi shtick worthy of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000631/">Ridley Scott</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000118/">John Carpenter</a>, Stranger Things 2 modulates away from that and into a related type of horror that is, perhaps, more literary than cinematic.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192573/original/file-20171031-18700-12f54f2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The gang in Stranger Things 2, in their Ghostbusters Halloween tribute.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This centres on a figure that features in trailers, on posters, and which appears in the very first episode. A gargantuan being made up of coiling smoke and darkness, a towering force all tenebrous and sublime, a strange thing that is both arachnoid and cephalopod and so thoroughly anterior to anything even remotely human – whatever it is, it looms over everything in a storm of red, and it wants to kill.</p>
<p>The struggle to find a meaningful noun for this entity – which the Stranger Things wiki describes as both Shadow Monster and Mind Flayer – is revealing of its textual origin. This is the kind of “indescribable” monstrosity familiar to many from the weird fiction of <a href="http://www.hplovecraft.com/">H. P. Lovecraft</a>. </p>
<p>The creators of Stranger Things have acknowledged precisely this influence on the new season: “There’s an H.P. Lovecraft sort of approach,” <a href="https://screenrant.com/stranger-things-season-2-monster-influences-lovecraft/">confirms Matt Duffer</a>, “this inter-dimensional being that is sort of beyond human comprehension. We purposely don’t want to go too much into what it is or what it wants.”</p>
<p>Moreover, it is in a Lovecraft story, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/872713.The_Shadow_Out_of_Time">The Shadow Out of Time</a> (1935), that we find an origin for the series’ title: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>As I have said, it was not immediately that these wild visions began to hold their terrifying quality. Certainly, many persons have dreamed intrinsically stranger things – things compounded of unrelated scraps of daily life, pictures, and reading, and arranged in fantastically novel forms by the unchecked caprices of sleep. For some time I accepted the visions as natural, even though I had never before been an extravagant dreamer.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Visually, however, the inter-dimensional being that haunts Stranger Things 2 owes just as much to what might be the single most effective adaptation of Lovecraft onto screen. </p>
<p>The 2015 videogame, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloodborne">Bloodborne</a>, was marketed as traditional gothic horror. Its first acts are set in an isolated city, Yarnham, gone to hell in a lycanthropic scourge of beasts. It is only later revealed that the Yarnhamites had been worshiping an ancient, eldritch race whose reality overlays our own. In other words, the Great Ones had been there all along, we just lacked the insight to see them. </p>
<p>That’s the point of both Lovecraft and Stranger Things. Horror is everywhere and immanent but it’s not necessarily visible. And, once you glimpse it – in Bloodborne, clinging to the roof of a heretofore familiar chapel – it can’t be unseen. Lovecraft’s defining affect is not so much fear or revulsion as it is a kind of haunted fascination. We can say much the same for Stranger Things. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192581/original/file-20171031-18689-zpmop3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The monster revealed in Bloodborne.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Bloodborne</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The horror of capitalism</h2>
<p>How do we make sense of this apparent commitment to Lovecraftian horror? </p>
<p>The first season of Stranger Things was an affirmation of collective identities, the bonds of childhood friendship that cut across race, class, and gender. It is, I have suggested, a visual narrative whose nostalgia is not just for 1980s culture, but also a profound longing for the old conflict between communal vitality and capitalist alienation. </p>
<p>This longing is informed by history, and especially by the antagonism between American capitalism and Soviet communism. Stranger Things 2 retains this historical backdrop, with its endemic fear of communists, and supplements it with a tour of urban blight in the American Midwest. Chicago – in which a late side-plot episode takes place – is all roving gangs and trashcan fires. </p>
<p>Horror, in Stranger Things, emanates from the underside of North America in the 1980s. The unleashing of that monster, whatever it might be, results from the repressive gestures taken by capitalism to secure victory over its opposition, both local and global. </p>
<p>It was, of course, during the 1980s that Ronald Reagan dismantled unions and deregulated the market, therefore obliterating any sort of collective identity that might sustain revolutionary unity and pose a threat to American capitalism. This obliteration is what Stranger Things pits its heroes against – and that is why Stranger Things 2 is required viewing for socialists this Halloween.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86614/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark Steven does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Stranger Things 2 finds its monsters in Reagan-era capitalism. It is required viewing for socialists this Halloween.Mark Steven, Research Fellow, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/834172017-10-26T12:58:23Z2017-10-26T12:58:23ZStranger Things is the Upside Down to Disney’s cute and cuddly universe<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191726/original/file-20171024-30556-yf94wo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Gone and forgotten: Barb.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since it appeared on Netflix in July 2016, Stranger Things has attracted a cult following. From the outset, the show – which is set in 1980s Indiana – uses the <a href="https://theconversation.com/stranger-things-inventiveness-in-the-age-of-the-netflix-original-84340">toys, games and fashions</a> of the decade to draw in its young adult viewers. It is the perfect nostalgic throwback for a generation which grew up on a diet of Steven Spielberg-style fantasy films such as <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083866/">ET</a>, The Goonies and Jumanji – films where children go on epic adventures to return an alien to his home planet, dig up missing pirate treasure, or complete a magical board game.</p>
<p>As with these films, Stranger Things’ group of leading child characters have an adventure thrust upon them. The <a href="https://www.polygon.com/2016/7/22/12236884/stranger-things-netflix-dungeons-and-dragons">Dungeons and Dragons-playing</a> middle schoolers are geeky outsiders – members of the audio-visual club, whose schooldays are plagued by bullying. And yet when one of their number goes missing they take it upon themselves to find him – and in the process uncover supernatural secrets in their hometown. </p>
<p>The plot is all-too familiar – thanks to many a movie from Disney. The animation giant has told of the plight of the lost child in its movies for decades now. Films such as <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110357/">The Lion King</a> – along with older animations such as <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034492/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Bambi</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033563/?ref_=nv_sr_2">Dumbo</a> – urge the viewer to identify with a child deprived of (or separated from) one or both parents. </p>
<p>But Stranger Things is not a show for kids – and its creators the Duffer Brothers have not set out to be the new Disney. With a terrifying demo-gorgon on the loose and the prospect of spending eternity in the Upside Down – a parallel universe where monsters roam – Stranger Things has instead taken this plot theme in a very different direction, pushing grown-up viewers to relate instead to the adults of the story.</p>
<p>It feels familiar, but it is not the same: Stranger Things is the Upside Down to Disney’s saccharine universe.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/R1ZXOOLMJ8s?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>Strange things, familiar formulas</h2>
<p>In Disney’s The Lion King, we follow young Simba after he is told to flee the pridelands by uncle Scar after the death of his father Mufasa. In Stranger Things, on the other hand, when 12-year-old Will Byers is taken into the Upside Down, we follow the story in equal measures from the perspective of his mother and his young friends and older brother. In fact it is the adult characters that are either temporarily or permanently separated from their children who transform the well-used plight from old trope to fresh take. </p>
<p>Will’s mother Joyce Byers, police chief Jim Hopper, scientist Dr Martin Brenner – we are told that all of these characters have lost children and are either engaged in a struggle to be reunited with them or are defined by their grief. The characters and plot are all motivated by the hole left by an absent child – a void which cannot be filled by anything but the child itself.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191727/original/file-20171024-30558-eqbyku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A mother will stop at nothing to find her son.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The missing number</h2>
<p>During the first series, viewers felt the familiar fear of being the lost child, but were given a new, almost schizophrenic identification, as they also related to the bereft parents. And though there is a sense of relief in Will Byers’s reunion with his mother, the same cannot be said for Eleven, who Will’s friends team up with her as they search. Eleven is a girl with supernatural abilities who was taken from her biological mother Terry Ives and brought up in a secret laboratory where her powers were pushed to the limits by Dr Brenner. </p>
<p>Throughout the series we want Eleven to find a new family, for her pain to be assuaged and for her to be welcomed into a human society from which she has always been alienated. The series demands that the horror of the lost child be put to an end. It is the reason we watch. Yet we are handed a peculiar and frustrating ending. Eleven vanishes into the Upside Down – and though Will is returns, he has brought some of its terrors back with him. </p>
<p>We sympathise with parents separated from their children, yet at the last moment Eleven is deprived of her new family, unable to return to her mother who is in a catatonic state. Identifying with the parents of lost children, we are forced to bear that very fact – we do not get our lost child back and the family is not restored. Even though Will is back at home, he too does not have the happy ending that we have come to expect.</p>
<p>Compounding this hypocrisy of unfinished families is the fact that Barbara “Barb” Holland’s mother, the only mother to actually have a child die in the first season, is entirely forgotten. Barb is taken into the Upside Down and killed in an early episode, seemingly as a stepping stone to develop the other teenage characters. This, the only grief worth grieving, the only genuine and unmitigated loss, is ignored. The horrific event – the death of a child – which the series in its entirety strives to resist occurs as a plot device within it.</p>
<p>Where Stranger Things will go from here is at present unknown. It has been confirmed that the show is going to <a href="https://www.inverse.com/article/27658-stranger-things-season-2-eleven-upside-down-terry-ives-millie-bobby-brown">use the second series</a> to delve into Eleven’s back story, but given what viewers have already seen this is sure to be no tale of friendly woodland creatures and fairy godmothers.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83417/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nick Lee does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>No happy endings in this dark fantasy about lost children.Nick Lee, Teaching Fellow in Film History and Critical Theory, Royal Holloway University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/706172016-12-20T15:02:42Z2016-12-20T15:02:42ZThe future of TV – where documentary meets fiction meets mocumentary<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150787/original/image-20161219-24271-1vxivct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A scene from the TV mini-series, 'Mars'.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">National Geographic</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="http://www.natgeotv.com/za">National Geographic Channel</a> is known for its nature documentaries, not for fictional television programming. But the recently launched TV mini-series <a href="http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/mars/">“Mars”</a> seems to mark a distinct move away from their regular programming. This series combines “real” documentary with fiction and mocumentary in a formula that is not only different from NatGeo’s regular offering, but also from other series currently available on conventional broadcast and streaming platforms.</p>
<p>The six-episode series stands at the centre of a multi-platform, multimedia Mars-focussed project. National Geographic magazine’s November issue featured a Mars <a href="http://press.nationalgeographic.com/2016/10/10/national-geographic-magazine-november-2016/">cover story</a>. NatGeo has made an eight-lesson Mars school <a href="http://media.nationalgeographic.org/assets/file/MARS_CURRICULUM_GUIDE_FORMSVERSION_ALL_FINAL.pdf">curriculum guide</a> available for free online. </p>
<p>They have published <a href="https://shop.nationalgeographic.com/product/books/books/space/mars">two books</a> about Mars, one aimed at adults and one at children. Their website offers a slew of online resources including interviews with the cast and crew, exclusive <a href="http://www.spacex.com/">SpaceX</a> <a href="http://www.makemarshome.com/">rocket test footage</a> and an interactive Mars surface map.</p>
<h2>From bird hide to premium TV?</h2>
<p>In recent years the number of television series available on conventional broadcast and streaming platforms has <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9301867/peak-tv">grown exponentially</a>. The downside for TV channels of the <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/01/21/there-s-too-much-damn-tv.html">over-abundance of choice</a> has been that audience attention and viewing loyalty has become diluted. It has become increasingly challenging to capture and retain viewers.</p>
<p>Mainstream Hollywood movies have grown progressively <a href="http://europe.newsweek.com/movies-suck-now-and-theyre-only-going-get-worse-334582?rm=eu">more formulaic</a>. Big studios and distributors hedge their bets on sequels, remakes, tested formats and building so-called “universes” like that of the <a href="http://marvel.com/movies/all">Marvel</a> superheroes. These formulas are supposed to draw audiences that want to repeat past positive experiences rather than be challenged by new perspectives in independent films.</p>
<p>Enter premium television. The big-budget, high production-value, star-studded television series that exemplify this phenomenon completely changed previously held perceptions that A-list actors, writers and directors simply don’t work in TV. <a href="http://www.kevinspacey.com/">Kevin Spacey</a>, though he has had a stellar feature film career, has now become almost synonymous with <a href="https://www.netflix.com/za/">Netflix</a>’s <a href="https://www.netflix.com/za/title/70178217">“House of Cards”</a>.</p>
<p>Award winning <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/stevensoderbergh">Stephen Soderbergh</a> produced and directed <a href="http://www.cinemax.com/the-knick/">“The Knick”</a> for Cinemax. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/stranger-things">“Stranger Things”</a> (also Netflix) captured the imaginations of young and nostalgic viewers. Most recently <a href="http://www.hbo.com/westworld">“Westworld”</a> blazed a trail to the top of HBO’s production slate and became an overnight phenomenon with fans around the world.</p>
<h2>Capturing primetime audiences</h2>
<p>So, is the ambitious, expensive and multi-layered fiction-nonfiction hybrid production “Mars” an attempt by NatGeo to capture some of this premium TV audience? What differentiates the series is the combination of three narrative layers to tell the story of manned missions to Mars. The first layer – real documentary – is set in 2016 and makes use of the <a href="https://epowdocumentary.wordpress.com/documentary-modes/expository-mode/">expository mode</a> to combine sit-down interviews with archive and contemporary B-roll (cutaways or visual evidence).</p>
<p>The second layer is fictional – a projection of what a future manned mission to the red planet may look like. Set in the 2030s, it starts in 2033 with the launch of the first mission.</p>
<p>The third layer can be characterised as mocumentary, since it uses the conventions of expository documentary (interviews and B-roll). But the interviewees are fictional characters and the B-roll is scripted and fictionalised. The amount of screen time devoted to this layer diminishes as the series progresses, so that there is only one mocumentary interview clip by the final of the six episodes. Arguably this layer forms part of the second, fictional layer, but I believe it’s worth highlighting because it occupies a position between layer one and two – though the content is fictional like that of layer three, the form is borrowed from documentary, mirroring that of layer one.</p>
<h2>Layer 1: Documentary</h2>
<p>For the 2016 segments the views and experiences of scientists, researchers, thinkers, entrepreneurs and others involved in space travel are woven together. It paints a picture of the history of space travel, where we find ourselves right now, and the manned space travel that is planned for the not too distant future.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150796/original/image-20161219-24276-9mf8lc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">SpaceX founder Elon Musk outlines his plan to design spacecraft to aid in the human colonisation of Mars within 40 to 100 years. He was speaking at the International Astronautics Congress in Mexico, 27 September 2016.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ulises Ruiz Basurto/EPA</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s clear from quite early in the 2016 segment that it’s in fact a real documentary when entrepreneur, inventor and space explorer <a href="http://www.forbes.com/profile/elon-musk/">Elon Musk</a>, a man with designs on <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/27/13067376/elon-musk-spacex-mars-event-watch-live-stream-schedule-iac-2016">colonising Mars</a>, is interviewed. </p>
<h2>Layer 2: Fiction</h2>
<p>The fictionalised manned space mission, set in the 2030s, is scripted, making use of actors, sets, visual effects and the other conventions of fictional film and television production. The scenarios are clearly based on thorough and extensive research, however. </p>
<p>In relation to the first layer, these scenarios fulfil the same function that dramatisations of past events, or reenactments, would in conventional documentary. But, since the events are projected rather than historical, it would be more appropriate to call them “pre-enactments” instead. </p>
<h2>Layer 3: Mocumentary</h2>
<p>The third narrative layer, which includes scripted “interviews” with the characters of the fiction layer, serves to inform one’s understanding of the personal experiences of the Mars mission crew. These “interviews” are used to provide an excuse for exposition and as a short cut to establishing the characters before the audience is launched into the drama of the Mars mission.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150795/original/image-20161219-24276-hd1yub.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">South Korean-born singer Jihae (L), Canadian actor Ben Cotton and French actress Clementine Poidatz pose during a photocall for the TV series ‘Mars’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Here documentary devices are used in the service of fictional storytelling. This layer is, arguably, the least compelling and most dispensable of the three. </p>
<h2>Juxtaposition and the suspension of disbelief</h2>
<p>The effects of combining the narrative layers and their respective storytelling modes are multifold. The 2030s pre-enactments visualise the science and technology discussed by interviewees in the 2016 documentary segments, showing their applications and implications.</p>
<p>The 2016 documentary lends credence to the 2030s fictionalised projection. The latter becomes more believable because we know that the technology to achieve what we see in the fictional scenes is already in development in 2016. And in the inter-cutting of the two layers a conversation is created that highlights various themes and dynamics that are explored in both.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oxfVCafkdPk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The soundtrack for ‘Mars’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There is a strange tension in the series between suspension of disbelief, as one would expect from fiction, and intellectual engagement, as one would expect from a scientific documentary. This stems from the constant interaction between the documentary and fiction segments.</p>
<p>When watching a fiction segment, scientific research comes to life in a way that encourages suspension of disbelief. Drama conventions like interpersonal conflict and internal struggles are combined with action devices. These include visual effects, dynamic camera movements, fast cutting and suspenseful build-ups to climaxes. </p>
<p>The score enhances the dramatic and thrilling moments in the film. The haunting <a href="http://www.stereogum.com/1907425/nick-cave-warren-ellis-mars-theme/mp3s/">theme song</a> by singer and composer <a href="http://www.nickcave.com/">Nick Cave</a> that accompanies the aesthetically pleasing title sequence sets this up from the beginning of each episode as high production value fictional television programming. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150797/original/image-20161219-24271-12tise8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Composer of the score for ‘Mars’, Nick Cave.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Toby Melville/Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Blurring the lines between fiction and nonfiction</h2>
<p>The idea of combining fiction and nonfiction is, of course, not new. Errol Morris pioneered the use of dramatic reenactments to illustrate interviewee testimony in his groundbreaking 1988 documentary <a href="http://www.errolmorris.com/film/tbl.html">“The Thin Blue Line”</a>. The feature film <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1136608/">“District 9”</a> (2009) uses mock interviews with fictional “experts” to set the scene for its science fiction action.</p>
<p>Recently documentary filmmakers have questioned the divide between fiction and nonfiction through their choices of subject matter and application of form. In the documentary <a href="http://elenafilm.com/">“Elena”</a> (2012), for example, Petra Costa shifts effortlessly between history and memory, fact and fantasy to tell the story of, and process her own feelings about, the disappearance of her sister. </p>
<p>What makes “Mars” worth taking note of is that it combines fiction and nonfiction elements in a way that places them in balance. They inform and enhance each other without the one being foregrounded over the other. And the end result is both entertaining and scientifically grounded. </p>
<p>I’ll hazard my own projection here: we’ll be seeing more high budget, thoughtfully scripted and well acted pre-enactments in conversation with actual documentary in television series and films in the not too distant future. Certainly before we walk on Mars.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70617/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Liani Maasdorp does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The recently broadcast TV mini-series, “Mars”, combines fiction and nonfiction in a way that places them in balance. This kind of combination is likely to feature in more television series and films.Liani Maasdorp, Lecturer in Screen Production and Film and Television Studies, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.