Commonplaces: das ex machana, good triumphing over evil, and super beings.

In the 2009 Warner Brothers film Watchmen, many commonplaces are evident. The ones I am discussing today are das ex machana, known as divine intervention at the last second before disaster. Triumph over evil, the belief that good forces in films, books, and in other entertainment that the forces of good will always triumph over the forces of villainy. Finally, super beings, while not being a commonplace itself, they represent the common belief that supernatural beings, or people who have reached a high stature through extraordinary measures.
First of, Das Ex Machana, normally appears at either the end, or the climax of a film. In Das Ex Machana, a near omnipotent force intervienes at the least likely opportunity, thus saving the protagonist, or protagonists, from an almost certain destruction. In Watchmen, this is seen multiple times through the movie, whether it be Doctor Manhattan saving troops in the Vietnam war, or Nite Owl and the Silk Spectre showing up to save Rorshach (as if he needed it). However, in the Watchmen movie Das Ex Machana appears, but is also overturned and is disproven, as no omnipotent force was able to stop Ozymandias' master plan. Thus disproving that the Das Ex Machana shows up whenever it is really needed, no crises needed it more than when Ozymandias launched his attack on nearly a billion innocent people across the globe.
Next is Good triumphing over evil. It is comonly known that good will win, but as is the case with watchmen, even this is overturned. Once again, the villainous character Ozymandias wins. He kills nearly a billion people, in order to "save" 5 billion. While the forces of good try to stop him, and prevent his plan, they ultimately succumb to despair (as he intended) as they realize that they couldn't have stopped him. After that, the other heroes turn on Rorshach, the main Protagonist, and kill him. While the common place of Good Triumphing is there, it doesn't hold out.
Finally, movies that center around super powered beings, or beings of strong stature, always have strong positive moral messages and strong and justifiable characters, Watchmen displays this commonplace in the flashback sequence that details the "Minutemen" super hero team. However, the modern team of heroes serves to satarize that ideal, and ultimately reveals a glimpse as to how "real heroes" would act if they were put in the world we live in.
Watchmen has multiple commonplaces that it follows and at the same time overturns, which helps the audience to understand movie ideals a little better than movies normally convey.

Common Places

American culture is chock full of common places, or simply, ideas that are strictly unique to specific countries or regions. While America has many of these, I feel Manifest Destiny dilplays this best. Manifest Destiny was the belief that Americans had the God given right to expand from the Atlantic to the Pacific. This meant that no foreign presence, Native Americans, or other colonial power could hold any claim over the land between the Atlantic to the Pacific. This idea led the United States to annex Texas, wage war with Mexico, pressure and threaten Great Britain, exterminate the Bison herds, put Navive Americans into camps, and to discriminate against foreiners. While most of this is negative, it is purely American. These experiences are unlike any country had faced before. Manifest Destiny made the U.S. the first country to ever feeled entitled to something, but we wouldn't be the last.

The United States is host to a slew of Urban Legends, otherwise known as common place mysteries that has been told as true, and could conceivably be true. The story of BIg Foot is known across the world, while there is no proof that it exists, it has created an entire feild of science, called crypto zoology. Urban legends are so prevalent, because people want to believe that mysteries or fun and outrages facts can exist, it is a hobby or past time of some people to collect images or outrages stories because people want to believe that the rules of nature can be broken.

Debate day!

Well, last class is was hinted that we will engage in a mini debate over sound polution on the imaginary island of Kayros. I am looking forward to this, and cannot wait to engage in another group discussion such as this. This is a fun and engaging class, I think that this level of intrest will remain with me throughout the course of the class.

Stasis Theory

Lately we have been working on the Stasis Theory, which, in short, is just a really long and big version of copromising. Okay, it is a little more complicated than that, but the real issue is how can I apply what I have learned. Thus far we have done lessons on Kairos and Stasis Theory, both of which I understand and am fascinated by. Both of these are vital in every day life, and having been debate captain in high school, I have already begun to use these theories. I am enjoying that this class is so similar to my debate experience, allowing me to grasp and understand this knowledge sooner than I would have in many other situations.

Week 1(well really it is week 2, but we will call it week 1)

Well it is finally friday, and fortunately my friday's have my favorite classes and wrap up at 1:50. In English 1323, I read chapters 1 and 2 twice. We also discussed the idea of kairos, which fascinates me. It seems to be an idea that everybody knows, but that no one know's that they know it. I like the idea of it, so much to the point where I am going to use it as the primary power of a character in my comic book, I am looking forward to writing it this weekend. We also did a what was supposed to be breif assignment over Twilight and pop culture, but I turned it into a page and a half long essay... That assignment was great and I love those type of open ended questions.