# What motif, theme or subject would you happily see wiped from the face of the earth **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 19, 2012, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706 "2012-07-19T11:56:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/1 "2012-07-19T11:56:34Z")
If my children grow up in a world where there is never again a single g-dd-mned zombie, vampire, or comic book based movie, I would be very happy at that prospect. People, not only are vampires, zombies and comic book heroes not real, they’re not a coherent fictional concept by any stretch of the imagination. Stop. making. those. movies. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/2 "2012-07-19T12:05:09Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > People, not only are vampires, zombies and comic book heroes not real, they’re not a coherent fictional concept by any stretch of the imagination. Stop. making. those. movies. Say what? Could you please define what IS a coherent fictional concept then? ---
**Author:** ![JLRogers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ce73a5/32.png) [@JLRogers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JLRogers)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/3 "2012-07-19T12:11:55Z")
I’d do away with “Things Man Was Not Meant to Know.” It does seem to be less pervasive these days though. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/4 "2012-07-19T12:13:23Z")
The hooker who falls in love with her clients. I mean, come on guys… ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/5 "2012-07-19T12:17:23Z")
The Wife is a saint, the Husband is a jerk, a dummy, or Satan incarnate. (I do not include the “Wife is hot, husband is a schlub” meme in this, as that is the story of my life.) ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/6 "2012-07-19T12:18:22Z")
The idea that some person or species that is “more evolved”\*/genetically engineered or even just more intelligent is automatically evil. Or even more cliched, automatically goes all Nazi-esque Master Race on everyone. - And yes, i know that evolution doesn’t work that way; TV/movie wirters apparently don’t ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/7 "2012-07-19T12:21:23Z")
“The ancient prophecy says that a chosen one will save us all.” It’s been done to death, it’s lazy in that establishes that the main character is special simply by telling us that he’s special, and the implications of the existence of prophecy are almost never actually examined. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/8 "2012-07-19T12:22:25Z")
You’re tryingg to push water uphill. Vampires are immensely popular, and have been for over two hundred years (the legend is much older than that, but pop cuilture vampires with many of the features we recognize date from about 1800). They are convenient symbols and images for all sorts of things – represed sexuality, clas warfare, kids’ yearning after adult privileges, terrors of the night. If Vampires didn’t already exist, people would create sometyhing else to hang stories with these themes on. Similarly, zombies as we now know them date back to circa 1960s films, crystallizing with George Romero’s _Night of the Living Dead_. There were zombies before that, but this gave us the flesh-eating predatory zombie. And, again, there are to many themes it introduces that resonate with people – alienation, persecution, etc. Plus they’re really useful all-purpose Bad Guys that are easy to realize on film with minimal efects. And kiling them is so cathartic. Comic Book Heroes, as you rightly place them alongside this list, are also incredibly unreal. But they fill a niche. They’re mainly empowerment images for kids, who don’t have power in many forms. They’re wish-fulfillment images. The way they act and the things they do are dictated by their audience and medium – superheros fight supervillains but nobosy ever gets seriously hurt or bloodied – it’s approved, non-dangerous violence that they can recover from and go on another day – just like the coyote in Road Runner cartoons. Their gaudy colors and costumes are appealing to young readers and (just as impprtant) were brightly visiblre on newsstands. Things got grittier starting in the 1960s when they started trying to make superheroes more “real”, but that simply added to the [possibilities for more interesting stories. Marvel’s “heros with problems” in the 1960s lead to heros with serious problems and shortcomings in the 1970s and beyond, and eventually you get things like [ui]Watchmen\*. You might be grateful if all this was wiped from human memory, but lots of people wouldn’t. And it would simply be replaced with something else. In the 1950s you had crime comics and horror comics. In the fictional world of the Watchmen they had pirate comics. Would any of this be different, or preferable? I think we’d simply have different myths. In an alternate world, you might be railing against the prevalance of the damnned sexy Succibus and Incubus movies, or those Manticore comics. ---
**Author:** ![Rubixcube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Rubixcube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubixcube)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/9 "2012-07-19T12:28:43Z")
I would ditch the whole “people from ancient past/fantasy land are transported to modern day anything.” It doesn’t work, it’s really never worked. Every single time it’s just the same jokes and ideas, executed in the same poorly done way. The only real genuine loss would _Bill & Ted_, but I’m willing to make that sacrifice to avoid drek like _Beast master 2_. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/10 "2012-07-19T12:43:04Z")
That virgin raping, risen from the dead, zombie, who wants everyone to; ‘eat his body, drink his blood’, preaching peace, whilst his adherants wage centuries of war, in his name. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/11 "2012-07-19T12:46:07Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > If my children grow up in a world where there is never again a single g-dd-mned zombie, vampire, or comic book based movie, I would be very happy at that prospect. > > People, not only are vampires, zombies and comic book heroes not real, they’re not a coherent fictional concept by any stretch of the imagination. Stop. making. those. movies. :dubious: Yeah, I’m gonna have to say no. Some of the best movies of the last ten years were superhero movies. ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/12 "2012-07-19T13:35:16Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > That virgin raping, risen from the dead, zombie, who wants everyone to; ‘eat his body, drink his blood’, preaching peace, whilst his adherants wage centuries of war, in his name. This is Cafe Society, not Great Debates. Leave your issues with Christianity out of this particular discussion, please. **twickster** , Cafe Society moderator ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/13 "2012-07-19T13:43:13Z")
I have no issue with Christianity, I was simply answering the question asked, honestly. If your psychic powers tell you otherwise, they are wrong, not that you care, I’m just saying. ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/14 "2012-07-19T14:50:11Z")
Don’t be disingenuous. ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/15 "2012-07-19T15:19:52Z")
Batman. I am sick and tired of Batman. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/16 "2012-07-19T15:36:24Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > “The ancient prophecy says that a chosen one will save us all.” > > It’s been done to death, it’s lazy in that establishes that the main character is special simply by telling us that he’s special, and the implications of the existence of prophecy are almost never actually examined. Agreed. I can’t stand “Chosen Ones”. This theme is shoehorned into everything nowadays. The most egregious instance I’ve seen was in Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland. What the fuck? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/17 "2012-07-19T15:47:19Z")
Dark. Everything is so goddamn dark. I’d love to see a superhero movie where the hero isn’t fighting person demons and just have fun putting bad guys away. The Golden Age Plastic Man would be a trip. Especially with Woozy Winks. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/18 "2012-07-19T17:04:18Z")
Batman movies. I _like_ Batman, but dammit, you don’t need to reboot him every couple of years for the rest of eternity. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/19 "2012-07-19T21:53:25Z")
I hate destined children. Just fuck that whole thing in the ass ---
**Author:** ![VOW](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/vow/32/3043_2.png) [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706/20 "2012-07-19T22:16:31Z")
Gee, I was gonna say sticking Febreeze in everything! ~VOW [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motif-theme-or-subject-would-you-happily-see-wiped-from-the-face-of-the-earth/628706.md?page=2)