Average Joe
@AverageJoe · 3:45
How Swapping Gender Can Take Away A Film’s Warm & Fuzzies
And if you were to reverse this, if this were a Superman film and he was wishing that Lewis was back because he's timeless, he doesn't age the same way as everybody else. And she has to inhabit a strange female's body and he bones down. Well, we all know that's kind of rapey, right? There was no consent given, gets a little sketchy. It's not so romantic. Let's just say so
Bowie Rowan
@bowie · 3:03
Is there anything now reflecting back when you were growing up and watching some of the media you're watching or even with your own personal experiences where you feel like the expectations of masculinity and what that meant growing up were harmful, and it made you do things or behave in ways that you didn't really want to do. But you felt kind of controlled by this larger force that I consider gender expectations
Average Joe
@AverageJoe · 4:58
So it's just not me being old guy, like all these kids today are nothing but a bunch of animals in our day. We knew respect. I'm not doing that. But that film, directed by Larry Clark and written by Harmony Karen Chloe Cevigne was in that film. That was a very disturbing film at the time, and Euphoria feels that way to me. But as far as the trans character goes, I don't know if you've seen the new Save by the Bell
Bowie Rowan
@bowie · 1:58
That's helpful. I'm really curious because you didn't say too much about this, but I wondered what it was about euphoria that you found disturbing. Was it just the fact that she has some explicit stuff happening and it's teams dealing with some heavy things? Is it that aspect of it, or is it I'm curious. I really love your opinions about TV and movies
Average Joe
@AverageJoe · 4:47
Okay. So the new Save By the Bell is on the Peacock streaming service, and when I first started watching it, my initial thought was, what the f*** is this? Right? But then I got what it was doing. It was kind of making fun of itself, making fun of the old show, yet still delivering some pretty solid material once you get what it's doing. And there were actually some laugh out loud moments in this
Bowie Rowan
@bowie · 2:52
Like, part of what we talked a lot about in the workshop is so many narratives that involve trans characters are all about, like trans trauma when it's like, yeah, trans people also have joy and just like, cool, interesting lives like anyone else, and that deserves to be represented as well. And so what I heard you saying was that it seems like they did a good job with that where it's clear that the character is trans
Average Joe
@AverageJoe · 2:56
Something you might be interested in a film I watched. I want to say a couple months ago now 2020 film, obviously, if it was a couple of months ago, you see, I say dumb stuff sometimes. Anyway, look, it's called The Garden Left Behind, and it's about a trans woman living in New York that is an undocumented immigrant. Now, the lead character of Tina is played by Carly Gravara. I believe the name was. I think this was the first act
Average Joe
@AverageJoe · 2:11
Oh, and I meant to add, even though we were just talking about that aspect of the trans story being played out, I was acknowledging that just saying this is a well done story. But yes, I think that if we just kind of introduce characters and then just make them part of the crew, that does so much more to introduce these concepts to people who maybe aren't ready for them than it does to deliver The Garden Left Behind kind of story, even though it's a good story
Bowie Rowan
@bowie · 2:40
But what was really empowering and inspiring about this writing workshop I took was just talking about how we're never all going to get it right. We're all going to mess up in some way when talking about these things. But that doesn't mean it's not important to talk about or point out what we're seeing and the stories we're consuming. And so I really loved hearing your perspective on this. And even if you're like, oh, God, I don't know
Average Joe
@AverageJoe · 4:20
I hate in sync, and I don't like his music, but I think this cat is pretty f****** cool. And so I saw he had a movie called Palmer. He was an ex Con. I read a very brief synopsis about it. So it turns out in the film, he is an ex Con
Bowie Rowan
@bowie · 4:05
And this class with him was amazing because we did so much reading about how the way celebrity functions in culture and how celebrities become a kind of what's the word I want to use, like a space in which we, as a collective culture, are working out the things that are too difficult to talk about