The term monster, to me, invokes the idea of someone or something that acts evil and does harm, whether on purpose or not. I do not automatically think of typical popular halloween costumes, such as vampires, werewolves, and ghosts, and would even go a step further and say that these fictional creatures are not inherently monstrous in the same way humans are not predetermined good or evil. By far, the monsters with the most cultural capital in our current western culture include much of the aforementioned creatures, yet they may not even be used in the classic definition of monster either. Some of the most popular versions of these fictional monsters have them in positions of moral ambiguity or outright protagonists, such as Twilight and The Vampire Diaries. They maintain a solid grip on popular culture with easily replicable tropes and a consistent lucrative audience. In addition, they usually serve as an outlet to discuss crises of character like redemption, murder, and other topics that do not translate in realistic fiction. But the most popular iteration of the “Monster” in the past decade has been the extraterrestrial. A growing fear of mass immigration and loss of cultural identity has spurned this type of monster, the alien, in children's media and award winning films alike. As society changes, society’s monsters change with it.
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AuthorSoumya Jaiswal Archives
April 2021
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