V for Vendetta: Deep Thoughts About Fascism, Feminism, and Pop Culture Revolution

Deep Thoughts About Stupid Sh*t: A Pop-Culture Podcast

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You cannot kiss an idea, cannot touch it, or hold it. Ideas do not bleed, they do not feel pain, they do not love...

The (relatively) recent news that Stephen Colbert's show was cancelled put Emily in mind of the fate of Stephen Fry's character Gordon Dietrich in the 2005 film V for Vendetta, which is why she decided to revisit this pop culture mashup that took Alan Moore's graphic novel response to 1980s Thatcherism and updated it with early 2000s American angst over Bush-era government overreach.

The result, written by the Wachowski sisters and directed by their protege, James McTeigue, in his directorial debut, offers hope through beautiful storytelling, empowering feminism (even if the film doesn't exactly pass the Bechdel Test), and a partial breakdown of the psychology of fascism. Moore, who famously hates every adaptation of his work, specifically hates this film because it makes the fascist Norse Fire government look stable, when part of his cultural commentary in the original graphic novel was pointing out the inherent instability of authoritarianism. Rewatching this classic film in the current social environment did reinforce Moore's point to Emily, considering how generally competent everyone in the government appears to be in this movie.

Still, the message of hope and resilience in V for Vendetta is a welcome one, even if the pop culture revolution isn't exactly like the real world.

Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so why not throw on your headphones and listen to the episode?

Content warning: Mentions of torture, attempted sexual assault, and pedophilia

Mentioned in this episode:

Dominic Noble Lost in Adaptation V for Vendetta

This episode was edited by Resonate Recordings.

Our theme music is "Professor Umlaut" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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We are Tracie Guy-Decker and Emily Guy Birken, known to our family as the Guy Girls.

We have super-serious day jobs. For the bona fides, visit our individual websites: tracieguydecker.com and emilyguybirken.com

We're hella smart and completely unashamed of our overthinking prowess. We love movies and tv, science fiction, comedy, and murder mysteries, good storytelling with lots of dramatic irony, and analyzing pop culture for gender dynamics, psychology, sociology, and whatever else we find.

פרקים

1. Monstrous Acts and Humanity (00:00:00)

2. Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit Intro (00:00:32)

3. V for Vendetta Plot Summary (00:01:13)

4. Why Alan Moore Hates the Adaptation (00:16:10)

5. Violence vs. Compassion in Revolution (00:27:50)

6. Humor, Power, and Vulnerability (00:44:08)

7. Episode Reflection and Closing (00:51:28)