America, the teen-aged country

     In the short story "Young Goodman Brown", Nathaniel Hawthorne demonstrates the American Fascination with the occult. Set in Salem Massachusetts, the story is about a man who witnesses an occult meeting and has in encounter with The Devil. Some other ways this is demonstrated in our culture is through t.v series and movies.
     I recently began watching American Horror Story,  and without too many spoilers, there is plenty of evil and many alive-but-dead characters. It captivates viewers by, well, scaring the crap out of them. (I highly recommend it, by the way, especially for those who like the creepy and supernatural!) One character is convinced that the devil is responsible for the things that she's seen. The American culture has an obsession for anything scary, there are whole t.v. channels dedicated to it! (Chiller is a great one, plenty of B-rated scary movies, I've spent hours of my life watching and making fun of them. Most of the movies have hot girls, though.)
     An example of an American movie that deals with the occult is The Witches of Eastwick. Based on John Updike's (an american writer/poet) novel, this movie put a humorous twist to the evils of the occult. Leave it to us to turn the devil and witches and supernatural powers into a joke. Although I've never seen this movie, it sounds pretty cool, I mean, an 80's movie about witches that didn't know that they were witches, what could go wrong? Back to the point-- whether it's a t.v series or movies, us Americans just can't seem to get enough devil in our lives.
    Now, the big question: What does this obsession with evil and the occult say about our culture? I think this says that Americans are curious about the supernatural, about what happens after you die. America was founded on religious values, so naturally we'd be curious about the afterlife; heaven, hell. Specifically this obsession with hell though, it's like teenage rebellion. For a country founded on religious views, belief in God, it should somewhat taboo to find enjoyment in The Devil. America is just that teen-aged country that sneaks into the R-rated movie without it's parents knowing (and probably having nightmares for a week after). Not that I think it's a bad thing, I personally love the thrill of scary movies in the early hours of the morning. However, I have that teenager mindset so I'm probably a little biased. My question is, is our obsession with evil and horror healthy? Does it have any kind of affect on us and the way we live our lives?

Antiheroes: Why They Suck

In a lot of modern as well as in older works, one frequent theme is that of the antihero. An antihero is a character who really is a pretty crappy person, yet you can't help feeling sorry for because of their situation. They usually try to save the day but really don't accomplish much and the story has some kind of tragic ending to make you feel even sorrier for the antihero with the crap personality. I personally think the idea of an antihero is absolutely preposterous and quite frankly, most stories, books, movies, whatever with an antihero as the main character really bother me. (There are definitely some exceptions though, i.e House!)

In The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving, the main character, Ichabod Crane is portrayed as the antihero. He's kind of a creepy dude, a school teacher that takes turns living in his students' houses, hitting on their moms a bit. Then he decides he wants to marry this woman named Katrina because she's got lot's of money. I mean, this doesn't sound like a terribly great guy to me. Then of course he goes out at night on a crappy old horse like the idiot he is (Don't people ever learn not to go out at night after exchanging scary stories?) and disappears. Woohoo, another tragic ending for our poor poor antihero.

While I was reading this, I couldn't help but compare Ichabod to the historically famous antihero, Winston Smith. Now we should all remember him from our sophomore English class, in George Orwell's 1984. If you haven't noticed, Ichabod isn't one of my favorite literary characters of all time, so it shouldn't come as a surprise when I express my equal disdain for Winston. He was kind of a good for nothing bump on a log. Both of these guys wanted a woman that they obviously didn't deserve, both went on stupid little adventures that got them into trouble, and both had a tragic ending. I know you're supposed to find some kind of emotional connection to these characters and whatnot, but I just would rather not. Honestly, I don't care if the guy with a crappy life that he created for himself dies or disappears at the end of the story. Does that make me insensitive? Maybe, but oh well. Antiheroes are just some losers that are famous for being the main character of a work. They don't deserve any praise for that.