Media and Consumption in "SHOCKER"
In the final months of journalism class, my professor noted that the only true bias in all of broadcast journalism was not liberal or conservative, democratic or republican, but a bias for the negative. That journalism and especially daytime news seemed to exist for the sole purpose of elevating local tragedy into scandal, so that the misery and pain of others could be consumed by the public as product. This act of consumption can supposedly be eventually followed by a cultural decline resulting in the moral panic such vastly available information brings. This negative brand of journalism that paints a picture of the world as inherently cruel is especially insidious for the family unit, leading to parental overprotective suffocation. Craven himself was no stranger to this, and often experienced this brand of parenting as a kid. In his time, this firebrand style of parenting was undebatably Christian, but in the late eighties, a near-religious devotion to news culture seemed to be the driving cause. All of these themes are more relevant than ever as we dive deeper into the internet age. Wes Craven's Shocker exposes the culturally destructive aspects of both print and broadcast journalism as well as contemporary popular media through his allegoric slasher narrative and the Horace Pinker character. What makes Craven's critique of this negative brand of journalism so unique is his suggestion that the way to fight it is with unbridled optimism and love.
A brief synopsis of the film: serial killer Horace Pinker is seen in a dream by teenager Jonathan killing his foster mother and siblings until he wakes up and finds the dream has come true. Having seen the killer's face and car in the dream he and his policeman father are quickly able to locate Pinker, but not before he manages to kill Jonathan's girlfriend. Before being put to death, Pinker finds a way to separate his conscious mind from his body and while the electric chair fries and kills his body his consciousness is able to travel through wires and television as well as possess people in the "real world". The film opens with Pinker haphazardly repairing a television with credits overlayed over scenes of lightning striking and stacked skulls of the dead. From then on, the television as an apparatus and the style of news programming dominate the environment. Craven treats us to the funeral of Jonathan's foster mother and siblings through the distortion of television broadcast, and colors each scene of public or private space by playing and replaying these stories on televisions in bars, stores, homes, and even prisons. The film heightens the use of televised journalism as exposition by integrating it as a key element of his critique. Craven parallels the instant coverage and real-time, feed-the-beast journalism with Pinker's search for the people looking to put him behind bars, and watching Pinker absorb both broadcast journalism and print media even slyly suggests that he is only ever able to find Jonathan through the constant coverage of the incidents.
A common defense of feed-the-beast media since its inception is that a constant flow of information could potentially lead to the capture of these terrifying serial killers, with the 2011 Boston Bombing typically cited. But Craven knows, even before the real-life incidents even occurred, that Horace Pinker is not Dzokhar Tsarnaev. A closer comparison would be to Christopher Dorner, whose puzzling evasion of police forces in 2013 many chalked up to his monitoring of social media and news to stay one step ahead of law enforcement. Jonathan doesn't find Pinker because of something he saw on TV but rather through one of Craven's typically phenomenal dream sequences, and the depiction of Pinker by the news media does little other than to titillate the audience, providing them with the fear they need to stay tuned for constant updates. The serial killer of 30+ is described as such: "male and savagely powerful", "has battered his way to his victims through locked doors", and being "so intelligent he has managed not only to elude police for these 9 months". Too little of a description about him is given of people to recognize them when they see him, and after 30 killings the media coverage still has not helped the populace or the police get closer to catching him. None of this is to say the film is anti-press, and although the film never makes the distinction between constructive journalism and the 24-hour cycle style of broadcasting, Craven focuses his critique in a broader sense on what can be defined as "popular media", journalism as light entertainment.
Most of Craven's critique of televised content comes before Pinker's execution, and after the execution, once Pinker's body disintegrates and all that is left is his conscious self, he becomes analogous to television itself. We can even see signs that this is the case before the execution even takes place, where, standing in for destructive media culture, Pinker invades the home of a family by posing as a television repair service, and while the destruction he causes in the home is important narratively, the true thematic importance lies in the aftermath. It's paranoia for everyone living in the city, especially for Alison who had already lost sleep over the earlier killings, but absolute trauma for Jonathan. It doesn't linger as long as when Alison is eventually killed (which is still before the movie REALLY begins), and neither sticks for very long before Craven moves on to the next scene, but both murders are set up deliberately for that juxtaposition with the media. After that, we can get into the really fun stuff, namely that bizarre climactic television sequence where Pinker and Jonathan directly enter the realm of programming. Every program they travel through is violent, decadent, or misanthropic to some degree, and even includes, in line with many other Craven flicks, a tongue-in-cheek parody of a telethon pastor asking for money and threatening hell on people. Pinker and Jonathan travel through wars, storms, and metal concerts with each sequence further enabling Pinker's comically destructive behavior. They even fall outside of the realm and into someone's living room, allowing Pinker to literally destroy from the realm of television.
Shocker identifies the problem, and for the most part the cause, but what does it say about the solution? Look to the symbol that Jonathan uses to fight Pinker. A necklace given to him by his girlfriend Alison, and in the climax it becomes his window back into the real world. As cheesy and sentimental as Craven has ever gotten, the real method to fighting negative-bias journalism is with love. Love and optimism and understanding which together can defeat paranoia and the suffocation of contemporary anxiety. None of this is to suggest Craven is anti-violence in media. No one who invented and conceived the chilling Freudian imagery of A Nightmare on Elm Street could be, after all. Rather, Craven's film is entirely on the level, and is as much connected to his perversion of domestic objects as it is with his ongoing critique of existing family structure.
A brief synopsis of the film: serial killer Horace Pinker is seen in a dream by teenager Jonathan killing his foster mother and siblings until he wakes up and finds the dream has come true. Having seen the killer's face and car in the dream he and his policeman father are quickly able to locate Pinker, but not before he manages to kill Jonathan's girlfriend. Before being put to death, Pinker finds a way to separate his conscious mind from his body and while the electric chair fries and kills his body his consciousness is able to travel through wires and television as well as possess people in the "real world". The film opens with Pinker haphazardly repairing a television with credits overlayed over scenes of lightning striking and stacked skulls of the dead. From then on, the television as an apparatus and the style of news programming dominate the environment. Craven treats us to the funeral of Jonathan's foster mother and siblings through the distortion of television broadcast, and colors each scene of public or private space by playing and replaying these stories on televisions in bars, stores, homes, and even prisons. The film heightens the use of televised journalism as exposition by integrating it as a key element of his critique. Craven parallels the instant coverage and real-time, feed-the-beast journalism with Pinker's search for the people looking to put him behind bars, and watching Pinker absorb both broadcast journalism and print media even slyly suggests that he is only ever able to find Jonathan through the constant coverage of the incidents.
A common defense of feed-the-beast media since its inception is that a constant flow of information could potentially lead to the capture of these terrifying serial killers, with the 2011 Boston Bombing typically cited. But Craven knows, even before the real-life incidents even occurred, that Horace Pinker is not Dzokhar Tsarnaev. A closer comparison would be to Christopher Dorner, whose puzzling evasion of police forces in 2013 many chalked up to his monitoring of social media and news to stay one step ahead of law enforcement. Jonathan doesn't find Pinker because of something he saw on TV but rather through one of Craven's typically phenomenal dream sequences, and the depiction of Pinker by the news media does little other than to titillate the audience, providing them with the fear they need to stay tuned for constant updates. The serial killer of 30+ is described as such: "male and savagely powerful", "has battered his way to his victims through locked doors", and being "so intelligent he has managed not only to elude police for these 9 months". Too little of a description about him is given of people to recognize them when they see him, and after 30 killings the media coverage still has not helped the populace or the police get closer to catching him. None of this is to say the film is anti-press, and although the film never makes the distinction between constructive journalism and the 24-hour cycle style of broadcasting, Craven focuses his critique in a broader sense on what can be defined as "popular media", journalism as light entertainment.
Most of Craven's critique of televised content comes before Pinker's execution, and after the execution, once Pinker's body disintegrates and all that is left is his conscious self, he becomes analogous to television itself. We can even see signs that this is the case before the execution even takes place, where, standing in for destructive media culture, Pinker invades the home of a family by posing as a television repair service, and while the destruction he causes in the home is important narratively, the true thematic importance lies in the aftermath. It's paranoia for everyone living in the city, especially for Alison who had already lost sleep over the earlier killings, but absolute trauma for Jonathan. It doesn't linger as long as when Alison is eventually killed (which is still before the movie REALLY begins), and neither sticks for very long before Craven moves on to the next scene, but both murders are set up deliberately for that juxtaposition with the media. After that, we can get into the really fun stuff, namely that bizarre climactic television sequence where Pinker and Jonathan directly enter the realm of programming. Every program they travel through is violent, decadent, or misanthropic to some degree, and even includes, in line with many other Craven flicks, a tongue-in-cheek parody of a telethon pastor asking for money and threatening hell on people. Pinker and Jonathan travel through wars, storms, and metal concerts with each sequence further enabling Pinker's comically destructive behavior. They even fall outside of the realm and into someone's living room, allowing Pinker to literally destroy from the realm of television.
Shocker identifies the problem, and for the most part the cause, but what does it say about the solution? Look to the symbol that Jonathan uses to fight Pinker. A necklace given to him by his girlfriend Alison, and in the climax it becomes his window back into the real world. As cheesy and sentimental as Craven has ever gotten, the real method to fighting negative-bias journalism is with love. Love and optimism and understanding which together can defeat paranoia and the suffocation of contemporary anxiety. None of this is to suggest Craven is anti-violence in media. No one who invented and conceived the chilling Freudian imagery of A Nightmare on Elm Street could be, after all. Rather, Craven's film is entirely on the level, and is as much connected to his perversion of domestic objects as it is with his ongoing critique of existing family structure.
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