The Problem Isn’t Zack Snyder, The Problem is You, Part 2: Being the Best Geek You Can Be

Recently on Geekscape, the site’s founder, Mr. Jonathan London, posted an article defending Zack Snyder’s recent film “Sucker Punch.” He was particularly disgusted with the reaction the film elicited from a certain crowd of young geeks, who declared “Sucker Punch” to be one of the worst films ever made. He accused audiences and professional critics of lambasting a film that hardly deserved it.

I’m not here to defend “Sucker Punch,” or to attack it again; I have written my review and said my piece. I still feel the film is overdesigned, strangely plotted, and smears cursory proto-feminist messages over an obvious undercurrent of adolescent oversexualization. And while I think Mr. London is a little too passionate in his defense of the film (his essay is a wrathful litany against the wolfpack), I do feel that he has made an important point. I recently sent him the following message, which was my way of agreeing:

Re: Your “Sucker Punch” article. As so-called “geek” content has proliferated, and once-fringe genre entertainment becomes increasingly exploited by the mainstream, the meaning of “geek” has become increasingly hazy. The new generation of “geeks,” I feel, more than our own generation, has become less about joining an outside group, and… more about feeding into the main hive mind. Hence, when something geeky comes along, and it’s not quite up to snuff, the Wolfpack Mentality begins, and the teens (and less-than-professional critics) tear it to shreds.

The geeks have become the bullies.

Mr. London’s ultimate point is that we, the geeks, have inherited the Earth, and we’re not treating it very well. Let me give you a bit of cultural context: I recall a time (and you can accuse me of falling for nostalgia if you must) when geeks were still outsiders. We did not have any “cool” cache like we do today, and were not able to dictate the content of Hollywood F/X extravaganzas with our hard-earned dollars. Geeks stayed off to the side, playing Dungeons & Dragons, reading “X-Men” comics, and hoping that someday, mainstream Hollywood would answer our prayers (or badgering letters) and produce a feature film that not only featured our favorite superheroes, but would be stringently faithful to the source material. We still loved our movies and we still had our genre films, but we had to physically gather to share our passion. We had to scrounge fanzines and make grand treks to conventions to see our heroes.

A decade has passed, and the geeks have gotten their way. The most recent evidence being the national release of “Sucker Punch,” which features 100% bonafide geek imagery from ages past. It featured steampunk zombie warriors, young women in sexy fetishwear, holding swords and killing giant samurai robots. It had a train to Saturn, androids and dragons. These images, once relegated to outsider circles and the imaginations of love-starved, needy 1980s geek teens are now being produced, en masse, by the Hollywood machine. And geeks are rejecting them. In the last decade or so, geeks have somehow mutated from socially awkward badgering nerds, content to live on the fringes and compete in pseudo-friendly trivia-offs, into a more aggressive breed of hive mind assholes. The kids are not interested in discovering something new. However obscure your love is, there’s a website devoted to it, and anyone can pretend to be an expert. Or perhaps it’s been Hollywood’s increased co-opting of once-fringe exploitation material. Or perhaps there’s just been a simple social shift. Either way, geeks no longer have the relief that comes with a new genre film. They have an all-or-nothing bully attitude. They begin picking on filmmakers like Zack Snyder, or M. Night Shyamalan for not living up to their exacting standards. The spirit has changed from an attitude of solidarity (occasionally marked by awkward geek aggression) into one of accusatory and dismissive rudeness. As Mr. London pointed out, there is no serious critique from young geek, nor feelings of gratitude. There’s just a horrid and extremely reactionary rancor that boils down all geek media to either “epic” or “fail.”

Geeks should indeed be more forgiving.

But it’s a double-edged sword.

There are other filmmakers, I feel, who have been unduly praised for providing certain content, and not for, necessarily, making great films. Filmmakers like Guillermo Del Toro, Edgar Wright, and even Peter Jackson are copiously lionized throughout the geek community, not just for making a series of stylish genre films, but for, themselves, being wiggling, ranting fanboys. They were clearly, we saw, one of us at one point. They made it to the top (Why the aforementioned filmmakers have achieved such a status, and Zack Snyder has not is a matter of taste, I suppose).

Edgar Wright’s films are rambunctious and over-energetic and a bit messy. Doubly so for Del Toro (although his “Pan’s Labyrinth” came close to greatness). Peter Jackson used to make geek films (“Dead Alive” “Bad Taste”), and, strangely, abandoned his usual tropes to make an over-long and stringently detailed and perfectly boring 12-hour film based on The Lord of the Rings, one of the single most lauded geek films of recent memory. These people provide comic book imagery and fantastical ideas, and are made canon giants because of it. The response is never measured or critically even. It’s, again, a result of the all-or-nothing attitude of young geeks.

(N.B. I don’t want to sound like I preferred geek culture before it “sold out,” and that it was better when it was on the fringe, but… well, there was more purity of vision when it was on the edge; any culture, according to most studies – be it subculture, popular culture or ancient culture – loses its strength and clarity as its members increase. Geeks are now professional filmmakers, they control what they want. And we’re using that power to make live-action Transformers films that we never asked for. The geek audience may hate these films, but, as Mr. London pointed out, it’s exactly what they’ve asked for. It’s their own fault.)

Rather than sitting and accusing you young geeks of ruining geekdom, and pointing out (however rightly) that you too often give in to hive-like wolfpack mentality, I would like to offer the following list of rules to shape you. To help you grow into better geeks. To turn you from ranting and vitriolic bullies into smarter, more dynamic and more appreciative critics of geek content. I, essentially, want to make you the best geeks you can be.

1): Go back in the closet. Geeks have gained control of the popular media for the time being, and we need to realize that it cannot last. The superhero trend will end, comic books will wane in popularity, and the world will alter itself in ways we cannot predict. If you tie your cart to what’s popular, you are doomed to crash into the ravine of waning popular opinion. Your job is to love something because you love it, and damn however embarrassing it is. You can express yourself online, and rant to your friends, but you shouldn’t insist on your way of looking at things; Your identity is, more than ever, defined by what you love. Make sure you really love it, and can continue to love it, however your peers feel about it. I’m convinced a lot of geek lore will soon vanish, and we’ll have to go back in the closet anyway. When this happens, you’ll be ready.

2): Be driven by your passions. What you love should be dictated by the powers within you, not by what you read online. You may have heard that “Sucker Punch” was rotten, and that all your friends hated it, and that all the online critics (professional and otherwise) have been lambasting it, but it’s not your job to agree with all that. It’s your job to see a film you want to see, and judge it by your own sense of taste. Your taste will grow and evolve as time passes (as it must), and you cannot allow yourself to accept or reject a film based on the hive mind. Live by your passions. It’s what geekery is all about.

3): Do not judge harshly. If a film or a game or a comic is bad, say so, and say why. If it is good, say so and say why. If you find yourself inflating (or deflating) your opinion of something to placate an audience of peers, you have become a sour critic and a bad geek. You must be 100% honest at all times. You’ll find that defending a lambasted film, or lionizing a popularly bad one can be liberating. It can sharpen you, because you have your honest opinion to back it up.

4): Be humble. It’s been said that geeks control the world. There is a feature film based on “The Avengers” in the works, which is connected to a series of other superhero films. In less than a decade, we’ve had two Hulk mythologies and two Spider-Man mythologies. This is all because geeks have demanded it, and we’ve proven, through our dollars, that we’re willing to see this stuff. This does afford us some sense of entitlement to be sure. Don’t fall for it. Ask politely. Enjoy what we’re given. To repeat rule three, don’t judge harshly. This is a culture where you will get what you ask for. Or maybe not. The point is to approach things with humility. If you don‘t get what you want, write the screenplay. Shop it around. Talk about it. But don’t ever make direct demands. It makes you sound like a douche.

5): Save your enthusiasm. This rule may be difficult for most dyed-in-the-wool geeks, but I assure you the best way to be a better-rounded geek (other than eating nothing but Hot Pockets and Energy Drinks) is to reject the advertising machine. If you hear that there’s a new “Batman” film in the works, you may be enthused, you may be excited, but you should not become a frothy, anticipatory weirdo over it. Even if it’s something you’ve been waiting years for, your best approach is one of measured, cautious optimism. If you allow your enthusiasm to take over, then what you look forward to can only disappoint you. Or become great before you’ve even seen it. Wait until the film/game/comic is released. Then suss it over in your mind. Then get excited. You will find that your appreciation is actually deeper.

6): Realize that films will not define your game/comic/book. Many geeks who are into video games or comics or geek lit feel that a feature film adaptation from a major Hollywood studio will somehow legitimize the object of their affection. If Hollywood makes a film of, say, “Half Life,” then it means it has reached the big time, right? Well, not necessarily. It may color the way mainstream moviegoing audiences feel about the game, but, surely it will not change the game. I declare the following: You do not need a feature film to legitimize the thing you love. If you love the X-Men, continue to love the X-Men. A feature film will not change that. If you love a game, continue to love the game. Don’t demand a film adaptation, or adopt an attitude that a film will change and grow what you love. See rule #2: Follow your passions. Don’t let a filmmaker lead you.

7): Realize that film adaptations are to be judged on their own merits. This is going to be a toughie for anyone who has ever written a review, and I may get flack for it, but I feel it’s an important thing to remember, and an aspect of popular criticism that is often forgotten, and is the source of a lot of geek rage. If you see a film adaptation of your favorite comic book, hate the film if it is made badly, and not if it deviates from the source. “Wolverine” wasn’t bad because they “changed Deadpool.” Say it was bad because it wasn’t serious enough, or it didn’t treat the character with humanity. “Resident Evil 4” wasn’t bad because the characters were different than in the game; it’s bad because it’s a really boneheaded film. If you’re a casual observer, it’s fine to bring preconceptions into the theater with you, but try to let the film tell you what it has to say, rather than merely expecting what you’ve already heard. If you write about films in any capacity, you have to be especially objective.

8): You don’t have to see everything. I know the instinct one has as a teenager/twentysomething to absorb every last film. As a teen, I myself went through a long, long phase of seeing films merely because I could, and not because I necessarily wanted to. I felt like I was building a repertoire in my head; a personal encyclopedia. Everyone should go through this phase, perhaps, just so they know how to watch movies properly. But it’s equally healthy to not go see movies. If you hear that the latest geek blockbuster is bad, and your friends are kinda mixed, and you feel like you should see it, even though you’re not sure if you want to… don’t go. You vote with your dollars and your free press. If you don’t see it, you are making a declarative statement. If you love the comic so much that a film would be heresy, don’t see it. It’s o.k. to stay at home and read. If you’re unsure as to what films to see, you can trust the words of friends, or of critics you respect. I hear there are some critics around here you might want to take a look at…

9): Never start a sentence with “I don’t BELIEVE you haven’t seen…” i.e. Stay away from shame tactics. Great films are great, and they’ll always be there for us to consume in our own time. Don’t ever make someone feel bad or guilty that they haven’t seen a perceived classic. Sure, that 14-year-old boy you met in line at Comic Con may think he knows horror movies, even though he hasn’t seen “Evil Dead 2,” “Nosferatu” or “The Exorcist,” and has announced that he’s not familiar with them. But it’s not your job to shame him. Shame tactics are a form of geek bullying. It’s your job to talk the films up to him. To find what he’s interested in, and give recommendations on that basis. To teach him, to offer “gateway” films. To see if you can get him interested in great works. Tempter your enthusiasm. Be humble. Never ever rely on shame.

10) Realize that you haven’t seen it all. This is actually a general life rule that can apply to all teenagers everywhere. You may have just broken through into the geek world, and are being introduced to Green Lantern mythology like the world has never seen, but know that, whatever plane you inhabit, there will be several around you, and many more above you. The geek world is a large and varied place, always there to offer new corners and pleasure to the young enthusiast. If you think that you’ve reached the pinnacle, you being assuming that you’re an expert, and you lose your humility. If you’ve seen “The Human Centipede,” you may begin to assume that you’ve seen the sickest, not realizing that there are people around you who popped their cherries with “Salò” or “Pink Flamingos.” Socrates once said that true wisom begins with the first realization that you don’t know everything. This is a good approach to your geek/film/comics/art education. Move through the varied pleasures. Know that there’s always going to be more.

Does all this sound condescending? Perhaps. I suppose it depends on your constitution. I only offer this advice on possible paths to clearing out the popular cynicism and bullying air that has infected a lot of young geeks and many teenagers who inhabit geek circles. Will this essay be Epic or Fail? Well, it’s advice. You make take it or ignore it accordingly.

After all, don’t we all want to be the best geeks we can be?

Witney Seibold is a film critic and luddite living in Los Angeles with his gorgeous wife and his collection of VHS tapes that he’s only now starting to upgrade. He maintains a ‘blog called Three Cheers for Darkened Years! where you can read all of his reviews, stretching back to his days at a local newspaper. He is also the co-host, with William Bibbiani, of The B-Movies Podcast over at Crave online. He is charming and clever and encourages you to read more