The Interview is a 2014 film best known for the controversy that it caused. In June 2014, The Guardian reported that the film had "touched a nerve" within the "notoriously paranoid" North Korean government. North Korea regarded the release of the film as "an act of war". The North Korean government threatened action against the US if Columbia Pictures released the film. This brought up issues over freedom of speech and the North Korean government challenging freedom of speech. As a result of...CONTINUE READING

The Supergamers was a documentary in the same series as Rise of the Superstar Vloggers. The documentary, presented by YouTuber Dan Howell, looked at eSports and the popularity of gaming. The show followed the lives of 3 British Gamers and how they are making a career out of eSports. eSports is a form of sports where the primary aspects of the sports are facilitated by video games. They are usually multiplayer games, the most popular eSports are League of Legends, Hearthstone: Heroes of...CONTINUE READING

Rise of the Superstar Vloggers was a one off television documentary presented by blogger Jim Chapman on BBC 3 [1st February 2016]. The programme looked at vloggers and their rise in popularity over the past few years. When watching the documentary I could see how vloggers could be considered postmodern. One of the vloggers, Essena O'Neill. at the end of the programme explained why she has stopped blogging because of the impact that it has had on her life. She talked about how...CONTINUE READING

Postmodernism is not always a short cut to mass audiences, some texts purposefully target niche audiences. An example of a text which does this is The Grand Budapest Hotel, which uses pastiche as it imitates the Victorian time period to create an aesthetic which only appeals to a niche audience. Donnie Darko is popular cult film which has many postmodern elements, it could be considered similar to The Grand Budapest Hotel as it is a postmodern text that appeals to a niche audile rather...CONTINUE READING

One of the main forms of postmodernism media is the gaming industry. Games are an alternative reality that people can interact within. Games can allow people to experience things that they wouldn't be able to do in real life. An example is Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V)- this game allows the player to of things which they couldn't do in real life without having serious consequences. GTA subverts the traditional ideas about reality and simulation. Players are living their lives through a...CONTINUE READING

Music videos are often considered postmodern as they use bricolage and could be considered as pastiches, parodies or homages to other texts. Sam Smith's music video for Spectre could be considered postmodern as it pays homage to the James Bond series and Spectre itself. The music video also uses bricolages as it takes scenes directly from the film and it recreates scenes from Spectre and Skyfall. It also self references by referring to parts of the film it is based upon. James Bond and...CONTINUE READING

How could YouTube be considered postmodern?  Jean Baudrillard said that 'the real no longer exists'. The mass media attempts to represent reality but the modern society sees this as reality. YouTubers appeal to people as they are 'real' people who have prefect lives. However, everything they put up on YouTube has been edited and selectively filmed. You only really see a fraction of their lives. The platform has grown rapidly over the past few years, more and more people are beginning to watch...CONTINUE READING

Levi-Strauss developed the concept of bricolage. He defined bricolage as texts constructed from debris of other texts. Texts borrow things from a variety of different texts to form something new. An example a a bricolage text is the album art for the Sex Pistols 'God Save The Queen' cover. The cover uses the image of the Queen which has been used with cut out words from a newspaper to create something new. Neither of the things used on the cover are new or...CONTINUE READING

Pastiche, homage and parody are all similar styles but there are slight differences which differentiate them from one another. Pastiche is defined as 'a medley of various ingredients; a hotchpotch, farrago, jumble'. It is a style which is a tongue-in-cheek light-hearted imitation of another's style which unlike a parody is respectful. Star Wars has been considered as a pastiche of traditional science fiction television and radio shows. Tarantino's films are also often considered as pastiche because of how they mis together a variety...CONTINUE READING

A metanarrative put simply is a big story off which people base their beliefs, the most well known metanarrative is the bible and religion. Other examples of metanarratives include science, art and modernism, they are narratives which make universal and all-embracing claims of knowledge and truth. It is believed that in the postmodern world metanarratives are beginning to decline and are less important to people's lives. Postmodernism is very skeptical of the metanarratives and believes that they are open to criticism, the validity...CONTINUE READING

Definition: 'a condition in which "reality" has been replaced by simulacra' What is Hyperreality?  In semiotics and postmodernism, hyperreality is an inability of consciousness to distinguish reality from a simulation of reality, especially in technologically advanced postmodern societies. It is seen as  a condition in which what is real and what is fiction is blended together so that people can no longer tell which is "reality" and which is not.  The term was coined by Jean Baudrillard, he defined it as "the generation by models of a real without origin or reality"....CONTINUE READING

Print based media, as well as moving image media, can be considered postmodern. Here I have looked how the poster for Star Wars: The Force Awakens could be considered postmodern. There are actually many aspects of the poster which could be considered postmodern, from the hyperreal elements of the poster to the aesthetic of the poster. On first glance you notice the main postmodern elements of the poster such as the layout of the poster and its similarity to the original posters, but...CONTINUE READING

Postmodernism is an art movement. It is a skeptical interpretation of culture which questions why things are the way that they are and aims to reinvent and redesign things from the past. Postmodernism can be seen in many different forms from cinema to architecture and from posters to pieces of art. There isn't one set definition for postmodern which is what is important. There are may different ways in which postmodernism is defined. Numerous theorists have came up with their own thoughts and...CONTINUE READING