Monday, March 21, 2011

The Circle is Now Complete

I know this is kind of old news, but it is of such severe cultural significance that I feel strangely compelled to comment on it, much like I feel strangely compelled to reach my hand down my pants whenever I see Kristen Bell on screen.  Since sometime in 2010 there has been a SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD video game, which is certainly not news to anyone, let alone anyone in the gaming world, at least in the up-to-the-minute sense.  When I first heard about this phenomenon, I was blown away.  As I took a step back to examine what wa happening I wondered quietly to myself Why does nobody else's brain seem to be on the verge of meltdown upon hearing this news? and Why do so kiwis look so much like testicles?

Let me explain.  The video game thing, not the kiwi-as-balls thing.  SCOTT PILGRIM the video game was based on the movie, SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD which was based on a series of graphic novels which was heavily influenced and informed by video games.  Bam.  What, mind not blown yet?  To some this might seem like a needless over-analysis, but to the truly enlightened it is like hearing Jesus's sermon on the mount that time he went to that Grateful Dead concert and got really high and stripped butt naked and jumped on stage and started screaming about giant flaming arrows falling from the sky.  OR something like that.  The point o the whole thing is, the thing that really blows my mind, is how culturally influencial video games have become.  They now inform themselves.  They have become a source of their own inspiration in a far more significant way than just adding some of Donkey Kong's cousins in the sequels to Donkey Kong Country.  It's like a cultural perpetual moton machine.  It's analogous to Martin Scorcese making a movie based a book based on a true story about an earlier Martin Scorcese movie.

It's not just inspiration.  Everyone is fucking "inspired" at some point by some kind of bullshit.  Thirteen year old girls feel "inspired" by their favourite Lady Gaga song.  Artists the world over are "inspired" by the beauty of nature, or tragedy, or the juxtaposition of innocence versus experience or some shit.  Yeah, I know, we're all inspired at some point in our lives.  The SCOTT PILGRIM video game represents something more than simple inspiration.  It represents a cultural shift in perception, a self-awareness in a sector of society.  It's like the merging of Commander William Decker with V'GER at the end of the first STAR TREK movie.  The birth ofa new form of life.  It is the difference between inspiration and self-determinism.  Anyone can be inspired to do something, but not everybody can be aware of that inspiration and let it guide you at the same time you guide it.  As Darth Vader might say "I was but the learner now I am the master."  Of course he might also cut your fucking arm off and blow up your planet.  Still.  He'd probably also play some SCOTT PILGRIM on his XBox while eating sushi and quoting THE BIG LEBOWSKI if he were still alive.      

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