DOC TAYROC'S [UNSOLICITED] ECONOMICS HOT THOUGHT

What J.J. Abrams' Star Trek and Star Wars tells us about neo-liberalism, part 3: It's just vibes, man

I hate TED talks, and I hate what they did to academia. Let me open by saying that. TED Talks are what MBAs who coasted through their undergrad and postgrad think intellectual lectures are like. They're all flash, no substance. They're entertaining but only as deep as a single pint glass. The fact that so many of the losers that brought us here, from David Cameron to Elizabeth Holmes have had TED talks should make anyone think twice about altering their world view through TED talks.

But, altering your world view isn't the point of TED talks, the point is to make you feel more comfortable in the world view you already have, and to feel culturally and intellectually superior for having it. TED talks are the expression of neo-liberalism in its purest form, 'this is the smart way, this is the only way, we just find new linguistic twists to make everyone here feel special'. It's the perfect forum for people who think they are 'thought leaders' and think that 'leaning in' is the key to feminism.

It's important, for the sake of this argument, to understand this about TED talks, because today's subject gave a TED Talk in March of 2007, because this television writer had 'revolutionised television' with his back to back hits of Alias and Lost, both of which were still on the air at this point. The subject of Mr Abrams' TED Talk? 'The Mystery Box' approach to writing. You see, TED and Mr Abrams both were asserting that the idea of having a mystery in the writing and using it to string along the viewers was a novel new idea. So take that, Agatha Christie, Arthur Conan Doyle, H.G. Wells, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Isaac Asimov, G.K. Chesterton, and even Abrams' peers like Joss Wheadon, and Rick Berman, and so many others. Abrams had invented the concept of a mystery for the audience to solve alongside the characters. What the hell is Hamlet anyway?

I'm being slightly hyperbolic here, of course, but to give Abrams credit for inventing the 'mystery box' is ill advised for a couple of reasons. First, when other writers made their mystery boxes, they tended to know what was in them, so that they could effectively foreshadow and help the audience feel like the mystery hadn't been a complete waste of time. Further, for most of the above listed authors, the point of writing was to tell a story, an idea. The story is in service to an argument the author is trying to make, a statement. In order to make a statement, a writer has to have deeply held beliefs. Tolkien was a Catholic who held modern British capitalism at fault for the miseries of the World Wars, and wanted us to go back to simpler times (problematic but understandable). Doyle was a fan of science, and believed that the scientific process would lead to better societal outcomes, from things as menial as 'solving crimes' to things as big as understanding (problematically) the afterlife. Wells and Asimov both also believed in both socialism and science as the two keys for the advancement of human progress, and wrote about scientific utopias and dystopias to this end. The stories were messages.

As established, Gene Roddenberry was much like Asimov and Wells, unsurprising given how much of both of them he read. Roddenberry believed that in order to create a star-faring society like the United Federation of Planets, humankind would have to move beyond artificial divisions like capitalism, race, nation, and religion to embrace the full potential of science and work together to colonise the stars. The 'prime directive' was important to Roddenberry (and Asimov) to make sure that the Federation would never become a colonial power like the British, French, and American empires had been. Humanity in the Federation is what Roddenberry felt humanity should be, not a reflection of humanity as it existed in 1966, a humanity liberated from the short sightedness that was causing so much unnecessary pain in Roddenberry's (and indeed our own) time. Kirk and Co. weren't exploring space for profit, empire building, or other self-serving goals, they were exploring space because it advanced understanding and learning. Self-betterment was the name of the game for humanity in the Federation. The Ferengi and the Romulans were there to demonstrate humanity's vices and how they inhibited personal growth. The Vulcans were, for better or for worse, an ideal to Roddenberry, logic was the name of the game. (Also a lot of scientists and writers back then were obsessed with the idea that someday all humans would evolve to be telepathic. Do with that what you will).

George Lucas was against the Vietnam War and the growing influence of the military-industrial complex. He was also into the Second World War, and like most reasonable people who are into the Second World War, was rather anti-Nazi. (Probably still is, unlike Mr Roddenberry he is still alive, after all). He was worried that Nixon, Reagan, and then Bush were taking the US down a dark road, one moving it away from the Republic and towards the Empire. He also had views on Eastern Spiritualism he wanted us all to know. Inconsistent views on eastern spirituality, but points for trying I guess. For better and for worse, he brought a lot of young people into politics and spirituality. Yours truly included, as I mentioned last week. I do genuinely believe that he thought Yoda and Obi-Wan were good teachers, and despite selling us a considerable amount of toys and video games, and other extremely materialistic things, I do think somewhere under that corporate cynicism was a desire to move more people into the monk aesthetic of the Jedi, and away from the greed, gluttony, and dark ambition that drove the Sith.

I'm not saying Gene Roddenberry or George Lucas are perfect, but I am saying they had clear beliefs, ideas, and motives for creating the universes that so many people, myself included, have spent God knows how much time mentally living in. Those reasons go far beyond, 'space ship cool, lasers cool, explosions cool'.

Call me a cynic, but I don't think J.J. Abrams believes in anything. I believe he says he does, but I also believe that he is purpose-built to be a Hollywood executive. The very same same Hollywood executives that made life hell for Roddenberry and Lucas back when they were trying to get Star Trek and Star Wars off the ground in the first place. Any beliefs J.J. Abrams professes to have are in service of advancing the career of Mr Abrams. He certainly wouldn't be the type to fall on his sword to save anyone not named Abrams. Alias isn't a witty commentary on the evils or the necessity of espionage or an examination of why countries and corporations spy. It's not a deep analysis of the nature of clandestine operations or a question of if we need them at all, it's 'spies are cool, look at them do spy stuff, also daddy issues drive plot development'. Lost, famously, ended up being a show about nothing. The 'mystery box' was the point, and because it was the point, there was going to be no satisfactory way to end it. There was mystery for the sake of mystery. (In)famously, a fan theory emerged early that the island was purgatory, Abrams expressed repeatedly that it wasn't purgatory, so imagine disappointment when it was purgatory, and the majority of other mysteries were ret-conned to be red herrings.

Sometimes plots don't go anywhere. I get it. I remember the Maquis episodes of both TNG and DS9, and of course it's frustrating that the Maquis got their stories cut short when it became clear the Dominion were better enemies. But it also made sense, from 'in universe' of course the first thing the Cardassians would do with their new found resources was exterminate the Maquis, and of course there was little the Federation could do about it. In the 'real world', the audience had never really attached itself to the Maquis storylines anyway, Eddington was annoying rather than sympathetic (to the point we unintentionally cheered on Sisko doing a war crime) and frankly the very existence of the Maquis was undermining many points that Roddenberry was trying to make with the Federation in the first place. Better to focus on the Dominion War than this increasingly frustrating diversion. To DS9's credit, at least they worked to wrap up this red herring, and in a way that didn't feel like a lazy middle finger to the audience for paying attention.

Spoiler alert, I guess for people not caught up on a television series from the 1990s. Anyway, point is, originally Star Trek and Star Wars both had a point.

Released in 2009, Star Trek began a trilogy of films with a ridiculous amount of lens flare. It also began a trilogy of Star Trek films that emphasised action over substance. True to form, Abrams had clearly only watched the films that had come out after Paramount needed a quick Star Wars knock off, and likely had been explicitly told that Stark Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was the best, as that would be the one he would attempt to grab a scene from for Star Trek: Into Darkness, a film that was less about the philosophical implications of Eugenics, the cost of Kirk's previous choices, and the increasing burden of age on a 'has been' captain, and more about 'Hey, super soldiers are pretty bad arse, yeah? Oh and here's a shitter version of the scene where Spock dies mixed with the (in)famous scene where Kirk shouts 'Khaaaaaan'! in a way that robs both scenes of their intended original meaning'. I could go into depth about why I hate the J.J. Abrams' Star Trek films, including the fact that they lack the 'cosiness' of Star Trek, the optimism, the philosophical under pinnings of wanting to explore humanity post-capitalism, of wanting to explore the cosmos, trading that all in for the 'cool' factor, the 'wow' factor, the spectacle over the substance. I could talk for a long time about the fact that Abrams himself admitted he had never been a Star Trek fan, a fact that shows in the piss-poor representation of the Klingons, the Vulcans, the Andorians, and the Tellerites in these films. I could talk about how Abrams' Star Trek films are indistinguishable from other science-fiction films coming out at about the same time because Abrams himself admitted he was a Star Wars fan rather than a Star Trek fan, and that likely explains why there's not a single bat'leth in the films, but there is a Klingon sniper, a fact that flies in the face of the ridiculous history of melee combat in Star Trek that Trekkies love. This isn't Star Trek as it was meant to be, as a statement of hope for the future, this is Star Trek as a marketable IP, put in the safe, but stupid hands of a safe, but stupid (and probably racist, as the miscasting of Khan was already starting to hint at) man. But his excuse, you see, is that he is a Star Wars fan, so what happens when we give him the keys to the franchise he does like?

Star Wars, Episode VII: The Force Awakens was a warning shot. Some noticed at the time, some tried to hold on to hope that the new trilogy would go somewhere new. It was largely a shot-for-shot remake of A New Hope, albeit with the benefit of modern CGI, camera technology, and advances in animatronics. Remember R2-D2? He's back, but now he's football shaped, because that's sellable in a kids toy that can be remote controlled from a smartphone app, for the smartphones that children allegedly have. Remember the Galactic Empire? It's... inexplicably back. Not in a way that is a conscious commentary on the re-emergence of fascism globally, but because shadowy operators brought it back in the comics, tie-in novels, and video games you should also consume. You guys like Simon Pegg, right? He's the marketable nerd right now, so we're going to make sure you know we put him in. Prince Harry and William are in there too! And Daniel Craig! But they're stormtroopers! How modest on their part and not at all ominous that a man who previously played a propaganda effort to make the UK's espionage efforts look sexy, hip, and cool and definitely not fascistic is now playing a space-age allegory for the literal Nazis. Don't read too much into it. Remember Darth Vader? We have millennial and marketable Darth Vader with a remarkably unique and therefore marketable lightsabre. Remember the Rebellion? Well, if you were emotionally invested in them winning in Return of the Jedi and want to see what the New Republic looks like, you can get fucked. It failed, everything you loved as a child failed, because an examination of the transition from revolution to ruling power is a bit too much for this nostalgia romp. We're resetting it to where it was in A New Hope, get fucked.

J.J. Abrams did like Star Wars, he liked it so much he remade it with no real changes. The 1977 film had been a box-office success. Nothing safer than literally remaking it, to remind the audience of earlier times. The audience also liked, allegedly, Lost, and Mr Abrams' TED talk on the 'mystery box' had been a hit, we had the YouTube numbers to show it. Disney also had Marvel, and a multi-game deal with Electronic Arts, and deals with Hasbro, LEGO, and god knows how many other toy makers. So Star Wars and Lost had a baby, and Star Wars suffered for it.

Part of the joy of a mystery box, at least in regards to Christmas and game shows, is sooner or later we find out what's in it. There's also another side of the old expression, 'it's the thought that counts', namely we find out what the person giving us the mystery box actually thinks of us. My dad's twin sister was notoriously a bad gift giver. When I was 16 I received a child's colouring book from her. This had been an upgrade from the pervious Christmas, where she had given me a bookmark, as in the sort you get from a bookshop for free. She didn't think much of me, and it showed not only in her biting remarks, but also in the remarkably shitty quality of the gifts she gave.

J.J. Abrams had spent much of his career failing up and being told how brilliant and special he was. As a result, he clearly began to think he was smarter than the audience and the critics. He thought very little of the Star Trek fans who had invested emotionally in a television series that he clearly thought was boring. He likely told himself that he was a better story teller than Gene Roddenberry or the many writers who had worked on the four Star Trek television series and the ten films that had come out before his 2009 film. He also clearly didn't like the prequel trilogy, and so and told himself that he could handle a 'redo' on the original trilogy at least as well as George Lucas, albeit with the foreknowledge this time that he would be getting all three films, foreknowledge that Lucas hadn't had.

Abrams also had a good working relationship with Disney, something that neither Lucas nor Roddenberry had ever had with the studios they were working with. Abrams liked corporate synergy, and loved focus group testing and reading critics. He was going to make films that played well with everyone. The result was...

Somehow, Palpatine returned.

In a recent book review, namely the one for Best's The Automatic Fetish, I talked about how there are some fundamental underpinnings to Marxist theory that you should always keep in your proverbial toolbox when working in economics and/or its close cousin Political Economy (PE). One of those under pinnings is the understanding that capitalist logic must always focus on maximising profit, largely by reducing cost, in the short term this is expressed in fixed cost and variable cost, but in the long run it all becomes variable cost. The other part of maximising profit is maximising 'surplus value'. The capitalist thinks surplus value comes in the form only of things like brand recognition, marketing, consumer retention, etc. The worker understands that it comes from the 'invisible gift' of the worker. In the realm of cinema, it's the difference between seeing the heart and soul of Roddenberry and Lucas on display in the original Star Wars and Star Trek, despite the limited budgets and cheap special effects. You forgive Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi for wearing what are obviously bathrobes throughout their misadventures on the Death Star because something more important is going on here, George Lucas is showing us his understanding of mythology, he is telling us a story of good versus evil, and the importance of the little guy standing up to a large and inflexible empire and overcoming all odds. We believe Luke's struggle, because it's not too far from George's.

A corporate writing room, with focus testing, means testing, toy testing, etc., can't repeat that. Inevitably the quest for reproducable surplus value that doesn't understand the inherent value of labour and treats all parts as replacable and reproducable will yield Rise of Skywalker. You can't management school your way to success, art isn't about return on investment, it isn't about corporate synergy. It isn't about brand recognition, and over focus on those things will inevitably hollow out the brand. The inevitable capitalist focus on ROI will bring bad ideas like, 'hey people liked Palpatine, let's bring Palpatine back', even if bringing Palpatine back would require set up that hasn't been done yet, and cheapens the deep meaning that Lucas strove for in Return of the Jedi. Bringing Palpatine back feels like a middle finger to the audience because it is. It's how little Disney thinks of you that if they wave Ian McDiarmid in front of you it'll be enough to grab your funds. It's sickening cynical and deserved to be mocked. 'Oh but they explain it in the comics/television/video games' is further cynical squeezing of your pocketbook. Almost as cynical as selling you a thousand goddamned hideous Funko Pops of the whole debacle.

The executives from The Simpsons, who created Poochie brought back the original Palpatine. Kids'll want to see the original Palpatine, right?

It's why I don't like TED Talks, it's the shameless commodification of it all. 'Academia is cool, but would be better as a brand, and if we could synergise the talking heads'. The same kind of nonsense that brings us worthless phrases like 'data scientist' and 'thought leader' to describe 'statistician' and 'idiot who barely made it through business school but now has a podcast'. J.J. Abrams is the TED Talk version of George Lucas. J.J. Abrams is the cynical neo-liberal side of Hollywood made manifest, incapable of original ideas, and just spitting out TV and Film tropes over and over in the vain hope that they'll resonate with audiences because surveys said they should. Abrams isn't making films because he believes anything or has anything to say, but because he has something to sell. Namely, himself, to studios that also have something to sell. The Abrams' Star Wars trilogy didn't exist to expand the universe, but to move product based on previously successful product. His Star Trek films were a crass attempt at making Star Trek into a product with 'mass appeal' instead of just weirdos on the internet like me, but doing that made extremely forgettable films. There was nothing in the 'mystery box' because it was just a loot box full of tat you've already got. The only thing in the 'mystery box' was a goddamn Funko Pop of BB-8.

As if to drive the point home, Abrams is incapable of avoiding racist tropes, even ones that his stars specifically asked him to avoid because he doesn't see people, he sees assets to move around in marketable ways. The Black guy on Lost? Make him a deadbeat dad out of nowhere because that's what the audience expects. The Hispanic man in Star Wars that explicitly said he took the role because he didn't want to play a drug dealer? Not only do you give him a line like 'somehow, Palpatine returned' that visibly kills him to say, but you also make him a drug dealer. Again, challenging audience expectations might make them uncomfortable, and so we need to fit neatly and cleanly inside that safe zone that will reassure them in what they already know and expect, so they'll keep unquestioningly giving us money. Black stormtrooper? People seemed uncomfortable with that, better shuffle his character to the back and quietly forget about him. Hope that doesn't blow up in our faces.

Abrams is a careerist. You know them, you've likely come across a few in your day. The authenticity is lacking because it isn't there. The only interest is capital, that's the only mechanism they have for determining value, and that's why it's all gone to shit.

I'm not saying Abrams caused all the problems, but his success despite his overwhelming mediocrity sure is an apt symptom.