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- Volume 13, Issue 1, 2024
Australasian Journal of Popular Culture - The Afterlife in Popular Culture, Jun 2024
The Afterlife in Popular Culture, Jun 2024
- Editorial
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Beyond the veil: Popular culture, morality and the afterlife in contemporary society
Authors: Angelique Nairn and Justin MatthewsOngoing interest in the afterlife serves to navigate existential crises by offering solace or amplifying anxieties about death. Popular cultural narratives, deeply intertwined with religious doctrines, serve as interpretative frameworks for understanding human experiences, ethical conduct and the mysteries of death. This Special Issue, then, explores how, in an increasingly secular world, the afterlife is portrayed in media narratives, which, while primarily aimed at entertainment, also respond to deep-seated existential and moral questions. It discusses how these portrayals offer a mix of hope, happiness and moral guidance, reflecting broader societal values and beliefs about life, death and what lies beyond. This collection of scholarly contributions aims to dissect the portrayal of morality and religion in media representations of the afterlife, examining how these portrayals reflect, critique or reinforce societal norms and values. By focusing on themes such as digital immortality and the supernatural, the Special Issue not only highlights the evolving nature of afterlife narratives but also underscores the role of popular culture in navigating and negotiating the existential dilemmas of the twenty-first century.
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- Articles
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Digital eternity: The holographic resurrection of music icons
Authors: Justin Matthews and Angelique NairnHolographic reincarnations blend the allure of the past with the possibilities of modern technology, navigating through ethical quandaries and the redefinition of performance art. Central to this exploration is the fusion of memory and digital perpetuity, pushing the limits of what constitutes a live performance. The holographic rebirth of legends such as Elvis Presley, Amy Winehouse and Whitney Houston sparks debate over the ethics of posthumous consent, the authenticity of such representations and the implications of monetizing the afterlife of artists. This shift towards digital eternity prompts a critical assessment of the moral dimensions involved in resurrecting artists through technology. Exploring the history and development of holography, from historical illusions to contemporary artificial intelligence-enhanced presentations, reveals both the technological achievements and the ethical challenges presented by these endeavours. The drive behind these resurrective projects shines a light on a lucrative industry focused on ‘Delebs’, turning the legacies of deceased celebrities into profitable ventures. Yet the quest to immortalize artists digitally invites scrutiny over potential misuse, privacy breaches and the erosion of the true essence of their legacies. Addressing these complex issues demands a concerted effort from ethicists, legal scholars, technology experts and cultural commentators. The journey into this uncharted domain highlights the necessity of balancing innovation with respect, advocating for a principled approach to honouring those who have passed. The concept of confining artists to a ‘digital purgatory’, where they exist solely for entertainment devoid of self-determination, emphasizes the urgency of establishing ethical guidelines. This digital afterlife, fraught with the risk of diminishing the soul of artistic works to mere commercial assets, calls for a vigilant approach to safeguard the dignity and volition of artists in the realm of digital legacy.
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The digital afterlife between hypersecularization and postsecularity in contemporary speculative TV seriality: Devs, Upload and Black Mirror’s ‘San Junipero’
More LessThis article explores representations of the digital afterlife in contemporary speculative TV seriality within the broader context of their attitudes towards the fate of religions and religiosity in contemporary society. Specifically, it examines the miniseries Devs, the Black Mirror episode ‘San Junipero’ and the dramedy series Upload. Set in a near future, these series present distinctive and contrasting views on the future of religion in the public sphere, as well as in private life, and on the development of secularization processes, along with the entanglements between secular, religious and moral concerns. The article highlights how texts such as those considered exemplify the current transitional phase western societies are experiencing, wherein conventional narratives of secularization and more complex deconstructions of the secular–religious divide coexist. Through the various ways in which a futuristic yet imaginable setting like the digital afterlife is envisioned and represented, these texts articulate postsecular and hypersecularized accounts of near-future societies. The digital afterlife thus emerges as a tool for exploring different world-views, forms of morality and conceptions of everyday life and the meaning of human existence.
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Bonnie Bennett and the beyond: An exploration of one representation of the afterlife in The Vampire Diaries
More LessThe contemporary vampire story is an apt place to explore immortality, the afterlife and other dimensions in general. Additionally, there are numerous parallels between the vampire story and the Christian story. The vampire’s ‘maker’, for example, can be compared to God, also known as ‘maker’, and a vampire’s immortality offers a relevant parallel to the Christian idea of immortality in the afterlife. The CW network series The Vampire Diaries (2009–17) houses various narratives offering such comparisons, especially with regards to alternative dimensions (‘worlds’) that can potentially be construed as commentary on the afterlife. Interestingly, though, I believe that the most compelling narrative in this regard involves the witch Bonnie Bennett and not an actual vampire. Also interestingly, Bonnie often seems to hold more power than the vampires, even though she is not necessarily immortal (she is, however, considered a supernatural being). She perpetually saves her friends throughout the series, regularly willing to sacrifice her life for theirs and actually dies in Season 4 in effort to bring Jeremy Gilbert back to life. She embodies the New Testament verse in the book of John that states, ‘[g]reater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends’. Despite that she is dead, she lives in a concurrent dimension, and only Jeremy is aware of her and can hear her. She is with him in the present. I posit that the storyline pertaining to Bonnie’s character and her death in Seasons 4 and 5 in particular offers a possible and even compelling read on the biblical description of heaven and the afterlife – and God on the whole – per Judeo-Christian scripture and scriptural interpretation.
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‘Where are we?’: The ghost as interrogative haunting in The Others
By Dennis YeoThe ghost raises fundamental questions of reality, identity and epistemology. The ghost is the shadow image of otherness that threatens our notions of life, humanity and permanence by intimating that if death is permanent and the afterlife eternal, then perhaps it is our present tangible reality that is the simulacrum. The ghost interrogates the quotidian, not vice versa. The fetishization, aesthesizing and ritualizing of death in the Gothic aims consistently to defer the final definitive ending of death and the state of non-existence. As a memento mori, ghosts remind us that our ruminations of death are not morbid, but life-affirming. This article will explore the depiction of the afterlife in The Others (Amenábar 2001) in which the living are simulations of the dead and vice versa. Unlike the typical horror movie, the predominant discourse of The Others is a postmodern interrogation of belief, truth and doctrine. The haunted house is an in-between land of purgatory, a death space of self-loss and separation that plays out in the conflict between religion and the supernatural. The questions with which the films ends – ‘What does all this mean? Where are we?’ – is not just a geographical question, but an ontological one. The interrogation of Biblical narratives causes the audience to evaluate the reliability of the discourse of established religion and its doctrine of the afterlife. By defying audience expectations of the generic conventions of the ghost story, the movie relies on the viewer’s faith that what we see on-screen is real, when this cinematic reality is as deceptive as seeing dead people artificially propped up to appear alive. Suspended between being and nothingness, both absent and present, the ghost is a metaphor for the simulacrum of film. The cinematic thus serves as the Other by which the real can be defined.
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Ads from HELL: Complaining about the use of religion in advertising
Authors: Daniel Fastnedge and Melissa L. GouldHELL Pizza’s advertising is characterized by its provocative art, audacious copy and bold tactics that relishes in its hellish reputation. Rather than merely relying on attention-grabbing stunts, the brand employs strategies that tap into the deep-seated cultural norms of its audience. Often deemed controversial, HELL’s advertising elicits strong public reactions, serving as a mirror reflecting the evolving cultural and moral sensitivities and the place of Christianity in Aotearoa New Zealand. This article critically examines the official complaints about the use of religious references in HELL’s advertising to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in Aotearoa New Zealand. Using thematic analysis, we analyse how ‘offense’ and references to Christianity are navigated by the public complainant, the ASA and the brand, in 79 rulings between 2005 and 2021. We conclude that while the brand consistently negotiates a fine line between edgy humour and potential offense, the ASA rulings suggest a societal trend leaning towards freedom of artistic expression, even when intertwined with religious undertones, particularly when a brand has a well-established identity.
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That time I was reincarnated as a problematic trope: Viewer preferences and cultural trends in reincarnation isekai anime
Authors: Matt Guinibert and Jo PageThe genre of reincarnation isekai anime, wherein a protagonist dies in their original world only to be reborn in a fantastical one, has grown significantly in global appeal. Yet, this genre’s expansion also normalizes controversial themes such as mental health issues, sexual and violent content, and the sexualisation of virtual minors. This article employs a data-driven approach, analysing user-generated coding of themes and properties from English-speaking fan sites, to critically examine three emergent and interconnected dimensions: the success of series deemed ‘trashy’, the complexities surrounding sexual themes, and the rising appeal of the ‘zero-to-hero’ motif in a post-pandemic world. The findings reveal a paradoxical allure of ‘trashy’ but popular content, complex ethical dilemmas surrounding sexual themes, and an increased resonance of empowerment motifs resulting from the pandemic. These discoveries provoke renewed discussions on anime’s role in shaping and reflecting societal values and raise questions about regulatory challenges in a globalized media setting. The study confirms the need for more nuanced understandings of the genre’s growing global influence, particularly outside of Japan, and calls for continued research to delve deeper into its complexities.
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- Book Reviews
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Marveling Religion: Critical Discourses, Religion, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Jennifer Baldwin and Daniel White Hodge (eds) (2022)
More LessReview of: Marveling Religion: Critical Discourses, Religion, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Jennifer Baldwin and Daniel White Hodge (eds) (2022)
London: Lexington, 285 pp.,
ISBN 978-1-79362-139-9, h/bk, AUD 168.85
ISBN 978-1-79362-139-9, e-book, AUD 70.59
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The Superhero Multiverse: Readapting Comic Book Icons in Twenty-First-Century Film and Popular Media, Lorna Piatti-Farnell (ed.) (2022)
More LessReview of: The Superhero Multiverse: Readapting Comic Book Icons in Twenty-First-Century Film and Popular Media, Lorna Piatti-Farnell (ed.) (2022)
London: Lexington, 313 pp.,
ISBN 978-1-79362-459-8, h/bk, AUD 195
ISBN 978-1-79362-461-1, p/bk, AUD 79.90
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