Comic Strips

Even if I don’t want to end violence in fiction (it’s a very effective theme of conflict) I do think there’s too much out there that normalizes the extremism of it, and especially the fetishization of death.

In the one hand, you have fiction where large groups congregate around arenas where prisoners fight to the death, and applaud the bloody carnage. I firmly believe there’s not nearly so many of this kind of spectator as fiction implies.

On the other, there’s fiction where, even amidst a chaotic and violent conflict, the heroes labor to save even singular lives of people lost or separated from the destruction - retaining focus on the preservation of life as the goal, and violence as the unfortunate but necessary method to achieve that.

We’ve also seen this in Marvel vs DC Movie universes - where DC has reveled in mass death and destruction, while Marvel, even if their large-scale spectacle makes it seem unrealistic, emphasizes the narrative point of characters going well out of their way to keep people safe; 90% of Cap’s signature Avengers “Why should I listen to you” plan being around how to keep the aliens away from innocent people.

I’m glad Game of Thrones has had a bit of this analysis too. There’s some very well-planned and tragic deaths in there, but also plenty that just bought into the theme of “anyone can die” without building any useful or engaging narrative theme.

To make the point in an unnamed game: This game showed one interesting person as the main character. After one chapter, it killed them off in a surprise twist. This was well-written and unexpected…but then I realized on my next play I just wasn’t interested in continuing - not out of sadness, but boredom. What they’d gained in shock value, they’d destroyed in stakes.