In the 1850s people romanticized the age of the golden age of piracy wirh books like Treasure Island and sir Henry Morgan.In the 1950s the romanticized the Wild West in countless “westerns” that dominated the box office and TV for more then a decade.In the late 20th and early 21st century World War 2 captured the collective imagination with movies like saving private Ryan, shoes like band of brothers and multiple very popular video games set in the era.What will be the next period we as a culture romanticize in the same way?Going off the pattern it should be something that took place in the ball park of 70-100 years ago from our day and age but it’s hard to think what would be exciting enough to fit into that category from the period.Maybe Vietnam??That still feels relatively politically charged though.It probably also has to be something I think that’s relatively uncontroversial and palatable to a wide majority of the general public.Maybe we’ll really get into the space race and the drama around the first missions to outer space.What do you think /his/?
>>18738309As a general rule, you can't go wrong thinking that nostalgia works on a 20-25 year cycle on societal things, and a 30 year cycle on political things.TV examples:' 1950's.. The Untouchables, about the 1930's' 1960's... every TV show about WW2 and the 40's> 1970's... Happy Days and other shows which romanticize the 50's> 1980s... TV shows like China Beach and several movies dealing with the 1960's, especially the war> 1990's.. That 70's shows
>>18738323The 70s also had MASH. It works even better because it takes the 50s/ Korean War years and uses it as a thinly veiled metaphor for the then current Vietnam conflict. It’s like nostalgia but also not really either
>>18738335I think some of it has to do with many (if not most) people, as they approach the 25th anniversary of leaving grade school, start to measure their own lives, reflect on past decisions, and reflect on what might have been if they had only done/not ______The big problem here is that it's hard to know which major (or minor) characteristics will be romanticized. Not to mention the problem of a real lack of definable characteristics. I mean, what will those in 2030 have to look back on fondly about the 2010's?
>>187383091990s. As someone who lived through it I was disgusted by watching one episode of Yellow jackets. It didn't look like 90s at all. It was like an 18 year old's idea what 90s were like.
>>18738309People began romanticizing the Wild West even as the U.S. frontier was still expanding. The mid-20th-century Western movie trend was driven by adults who had grown up reading countless Western novels, stories that often blurred the line between fact and fiction. Westerns were hardly a passing fad; they remained a fixture of American pop culture from the 19th century right through to 1950. The cowboys and pirates you mentioned are classic figures of the Romantic era, though the cowboy's popularity proved more enduring.As for what era might become the next big trend? That’s hard to say. In America, we’re still enamored with the 80s, but not enough to spawn a standardized, cliché-ridden genre like the pirate novel. A story romanticizing the 80s might feature anything from a ten-year-old kid to a cocaine-addicted Wall Street trader as its protagonist, a far cry from the rigid archetypes tied to specific eras (like cowboys and the Old West, pirates and the 18th century, or soldiers and WW2). Generally speaking, I don't sense much interest among today's audiences in romanticizing any one specific era. I’m tempted to point to the early 2000s interest in Ancient Greece and Rome: films like 300, Gladiator, and Troy...but those are really the only three I can name, and I’m not sure you could call it a true revival of the sword-and-sandal genre. Still, it is interesting to view them within the context of the Gulf War and the War on Terror
The hippie era, it's already happening with the film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
>>18738525>People began romanticizing the Wild West even as the U.S. frontier was still expanding.And it's surprising how quickly it took off. By the late 1800's, you already had travelling western shows.Here, for example, is an ad for "Pawnee Bill's Historic Wild West" show, which went on tour in 1895. If the Buffalo Bill show featuring Sitting Bull was the top of the pyramid, Pawnee Bill was not
>>18738557Some people saw all that and said "Yes, this has potential. It could be our crusade, our legend" and then started to make things up to cash on it. Very American, in my opinion
>>18738309The duration between the topic, its digestion and derived media has lengthened in my opinion. We've already been in the long 90's-00's media culture for 15 years. It wouldn't surprise me if we sort of got stuck there for decades, but tried to transplant changing sensibilities into it.
It's piracy again, like it was in the 90s. Pirates and cowboys go in waves.
something asia
>>18738865Pirates were huge in 2006, so this fits the 20 year cycle.
>>18738525Yeah also note that westerns in some form were also popular in continental Europe although it was in a weird form, see Karl May.
>>18738525>I’m tempted to point to the early 2000s interest in Ancient Greece and Rome: films like 300, Gladiator, and Troy...See this is a bit of a mirage and you're correct to notice that it has quickly petered out.After Gladiator came around hollywood briefly thought they're in another sword and sandals fad phase, but this phase failed to sustain itself. Troy was considered somewhat of a failure and 300 was successful but its sequel wasn't. Many smaller productions at the time also bombed.
>>18738309What do Pirates and Westerns have in common? They were both wild, free from any governments, the ability to be outlaws and take whatever they want. they are just criminals who were allowed to operate with impunity because nobody could stop them. So what is the most recent version of that? what are the future versions of it?
